Anna Ross: ‘Aachen CHIO is the pinnacle for strivers, riders and welfare watchers’

Anna Ross has her say on the importance of dressage basics, FEI tack rules and why education is key for improved public perception

Following a break after further surgery to my hand, I’ve been riding our up-and-coming stable talents. It’s made me realise that the basics are everything.

Part of coaching is keeping your clients, especially those bringing horses on to a high level for the first time, invested in the boring bits: corners, transitions, straightness. Once they’ve ridden at the level, the fuss about basics starts to make sense and the riders become as obsessed with these details as the rest of us. But first, they have to seem relevant.

For example, I’d say 99.9% of flying changes go wrong because the horse isn’t truly straight. Or if we let the horse die into a downward transition at lower levels, we’ll only have to go back and fix it later.

I’m convinced that putting the right basics into your horse saves wear and tear on him later, too. Too many repetitive movements are bad for horses’ limbs and brains.

One of the most important lessons to teach is that collection doesn’t mean slowing down. It’s like moving slower but with the legs working faster. More revs, more energy – not less. If you try to collect simply by slowing down, you’re just putting on the handbrake.

The opposite is true for extension: it feels like you’re going faster, but the legs are going slower, taking longer steps.

It’s the same with downward transitions. It’s important the horse stays in front of the leg, but you’ll find out if they really are as you slow down. Anyone can ride flat out, but it’s only when you can slow the speed while still keeping the energy that you achieve collection and the horse can start to sit.

Tack talk turmoil

Many thought the FEI’s recent statement on streamlining its rules meant the same tack rules would need to be used across disciplines, to present a more transparent image of the sport to the public and maintain its social licence.

Among much chuckling and speculation about who was going to tell the showjumpers, the FEI hastily clarified: “Nowhere does the report say that the tack and equipment requirements will cease to be discipline-specific and this is not what the FEI’s intention is.”

Their statement continued: “Although the FEI strives towards harmonisation of tack and equipment across FEI disciplines, differences and deviations on account of the disciplines’ technical specificities may be necessary and justifiable.”

A fine example of the inequality between disciplines was on display at the wonderful CHIO Aachen. It’s the pinnacle for strivers, riders and welfare watchers.

The warm-up area is public, and boy, has everyone got an opinion. There are stewards there dedicated to answering welfare questions from the public, who measure everything by the millimetre: nose in front or behind the vertical, ear positioning, tail swish.

Some riders tiptoe around the warm-up, half riding their horse, half managing the crowd’s interpretation of their performance.

I’ve competed at Aachen several times, and the irony has always struck me that if those eagle-eyed enthusiasts turned around and moved just 200 metres away to watch the showjumping warm-up… It seems anything goes – bits that need their own postcode, multiple martingales, draw reins, double nosebands – and very few questions asked.

Maybe we’ll all be riding our dressage horses in martingales next, to achieve that steady head carriage the public wants to see!

Education is the answer to improved public perception. I spoke to Richard White and Kyra Kyrklund at Wellington CDI about the public interpretation of our sport. They told me a story about a non-horsey friend who observed how much the horse must be enjoying the dressage test because he was “wagging” (swishing) his tail in time to the music.

A super summer of sport

As I write, brilliant news is coming in that our under-25 team have won a bronze medal at the European Championships. The young riders were just a whisker out of medal contention with solid performances. Now we have the juniors, children and senior teams to cheer for in a great summer of sport.

● Do you think tack rules should be the same across all disciplines? Write to us at hhletters@futurenet.com, including your name, nearest town and county, for the chance for your letter to appear in a forthcoming issue of the magazine

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