Call me crazy, but sometimes I think I might enjoy going to clinics more than I enjoy competing. Something about the pressure of riding in front of top athletes (and critical auditors) combined with the reassurance of being under instruction – or even just adult supervision – plus the inherent camaraderie of spending extra time with your own horse and fellow riders is just the tops.
Case in point: in August, I rode in a clinic with Olympian Leslie Law, a well known/loved rider, trainer and educator in the eventing world. I’d ridden with him on a different horse several years prior, and when I saw the chance to ride with him again at Bella Rose Equestrian, I jumped on it.
The evening before the clinic showed that no matter how prepared you think you are, there’s always a new challenge to face. My phone had busted (my husband took the lead on filing a claim and getting that sorted, thankfully!), my horse wore the head of his horseshoe nail down so much it shifted in his shoe (by a magic coincidence we ran into my old farrier at the clinic and he fixed us up), and then the starter on our truck went out. Fortunately, Andy was already safely tucked in for the night and I happened to be in my parents’ neck of the woods. They scooped me up, got the truck dropped off for repair 10 minutes before closing time, fed me dinner and even set me up with a portable AC unit for camping in my non-LQ horse trailer!
Thanks to the combined efforts of my parents, my husband and my old farrier, I managed to find myself groggily stumbling from my trailer to the barn to feed at 5:50 AM for a 7:30 ride time on Saturday morning. Symantha Melemed later aptly nicknamed our group the “we ride at dawn” group.
Stadium Day
First, Leslie commended forward seat riding as “one of the things you Americans got right!” While he didn’t dismiss riding from a full seat by any stretch, he encouraged us to give the horses’ backs a rest as we travelled around the stadium ring on long stretches. He also broke down the uses for the automatic release (staying connected) vs. the crest release (staying defensive) in the jumping position.
Warm up on stadium day was extensive but consisted of a lot of walk work, a small mercy for the hard working horses in the brutal Georgia heat! (yes- even at 7:45 AM!) Leslie’s exercises were mind-blowing reminders of the little things that it’s so easy to forget about. In this instance, it was turn on the forehand. This used to be a well worn tool in my own riding tool box, but at some point with my own horse I had put it down and forgotten about it. Leslie had us do walk-halt and trot-halt transitions, using the turn on the forehand to simultaneously change rein, sharpen the response to the leg and laterally supple the horse.
And then, when that wasn’t enough hardship for my fussy red horse, he had us flex the horses toward the direction of travel as we moved their haunches over. After much, uh, “lightening of the forehand,” Andy accepted the exercise and we even started to pull it off without too much drama. Next was some alternating renvers-travers down the long side, followed by working through a line of cavaletti, and then we were off to jump. We’ve been incorporating a lot of work on his flexibility at home and his jump has gotten better and better, so the lateral suppling in warm up paid off here too.
Leslie is a very positive coach, forgiving of mistakes and patient with worried horses and riders. He set up a round liverpool under the back oxer of a one stride ( the first fence of which was a neat wave plank ). My happy little novice horse and I had seen one Liverpool in the far distant past of the pre-titanium plates/screws era, but I wasn’t sure he’d remember. I knew the round shape in particular would give him something to take a good hard look at.
Nevertheless, my guy is brave ( ok reckless ), so when Leslie noticed my green face and asked if I’d like it to be lowered, I said no. After all, I came here to drink Gatorade and embarrass myself, and I’m allll out of Gatorade.
As I came to it, I felt Andy look at the wave planks and ask me “Hey those look funky, are we still a go?“
I closed my leg to say “yes“.
A stride and a half later, he saw the liverpool on the back side, this time pumping the brakes slightly and asking “Wha-wha- what?!”
My answer was ” uhhhhh.. surprise? Keep going please!“, so my keen carrothead leaped, dragging my not-so-keen caboose along with him.
I’m sure we less-than-impressed Leslie, but he gently reminded me to stay with my horse and sent us around to it again. This time I rode like I vaguely remember how and Andy was happy to jump it beautifully.
Later that night we wandered down to the cross country course to stretch Andy’s legs and graze along with Laura Duhamel and her two horses. No one can say Leslie doesn’t earn his clinician fee – well after 8:00 PM he was designing a course for us to ride the next day. And come the next morning, we were not disappointed at all.
Cross Country (The Fun Stuff)
First, Leslie lectured on suitability and safety for cross country, even mentioning an important little detail that I’d long forgotten about: shortening your friggen stirrups a hole. That little nugget of advice helped to stabilize my wandering lower leg while I hung out in galloping position.
We warmed up by opening and shortening the gallop, with Leslie reminding us that we can only send them as forward as well as they are balanced. Otherwise it’s just running at a fence. And that works about as well as repeatedly running red lights: you might get away with it 1,000 times, until the one time that you don’t.
He stayed on me about keeping Andy’s ears up and his weight off the forehand, and boy did that pay off when it was time to jump!
We started with a sweet little canter around the paddock lanes to gently come to a simple, straightforward line of logs.
And next we jumped a giant upright. 😱
My horse and I didn’t flatten, but we did peter out a little as we left the ground, so we fixed that and got a great jump the next time. Next up was a shallow serpentine line of a big ( to me, but probably not to anyone else in the group including my horse ) rolltop to the giant upright, to a coup. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy.
Andy was feeling confident and keen after revving his engine and setting back on his hocks throughout our warm up. So when our next exercise was cutout to corner to roll top, his enthusiasm was contagious. I just knew he was going to love the corner as soon as he saw it. We’d only jumped one before, and that was pre-titanium days as well. But I was right. Every time we jumped, even if we came a little short or long, he fired off the ground like a rocket ship. It was a good day.
A few of my own personal take-aways from the clinic :
1. Most accidents happen for one of two reasons: the horse is too fast or the horse is too slow. The rider must be constantly working to find the balance ( literally ) between the two. Leslie used the analogy of pushing a wheelbarrow up a plank (uphill balance) – which is harder, to pushing a full wheelbarrow down a plank, which is easier but also quick to tip over (downhill runaway balance).
2. Leslie was a big fan of walk-canter transitions in stadium.
3.To lighten the seat, stay tall in the center of the saddle while thinking about taking the shoulder to the knee.
4. Make sure you can send the horse forward and rebalance it several times to warm up.
5. It’s safer to buy a horse who is suitable for cross country and then work hard to improve the dressage than vice versa (score one for the OTTB fan club!)
He also talked about some of the harder to define qualities that all the greatest athletes of our time have:
1. Technique
2. Awareness
3. Instinct/Intuition
4. Imagination
My own long term homework hasn’t changed – get Andy’s ears up and forehand lighter as he gets stronger and more flexible through his back. Andy and I came away from the clinic feeling confident, happy and hungrier for running training level. It was a great weekend making new friends and getting to spend time with old ones ( family included! ) Cheers to you, Leslie, and cheers to the team at Bella Rose Equestrian for making it happen!
