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Pegasus was "a
winged steed, unwearying of flight, sweeping through the air swift as
a gale of wind," writes Pindar. Bellerophon leaps upon
Pegasus' back and puts him through his paces. "The horse
seeming to delight in the sport as much as the [Bellarophon]"
writes Edith Hamilton about the relationship of rider and horse.
A horse joyfully
expressing his inherent qualities is the goal of dressage and of most
other disciplines. "[Horses] are quiet, sentient
beings. They are flight animals. They are flight
animals. They are like birds. You have to try to teach
them again to be able to fly," says Sylvia Loch, one of the
preeminent authorities on classical training. She offers her
view of throughness and how to help your horse find his loftiest
expression in the dressage arena.
Responsiveness
Dressage has its origins in hand-to-hand combat, in which the horse had to
be extremely obedient and responsive to the slightest aid. Other
sports such as cross country, hunting, and reining also require
responsiveness. "I originally came from a practical rider's
background: hunting, cross-country--riding over all sorts of countryside
with all sorts of horses, and they basically had to be through because we
were jumping," says Sylvia.
Sylvia first
became interested in dressage when she went to Portugal. "I saw
dressage in the most amazing, impulsive, but very controlled
environment--the Portuguese bull ring," she says. "It
might shock a lot of people, but that's where I actually saw dressage for
real." The classical masters, such as Xenophon, as well as the
modern counterparts in the Spanish Riding School, trained horses for
combat. The piaffe, passage, levade, courbette, and other airs above
the ground are fighting movements. "If you don't have
throughness in those movements, a horse cannot do them," Sylvia
says.
The Great
Circle-Defining Throughness
Instructors use the term 'throughness,' but many students are unsure
exactly what the expression means. Sylvia believes that this is
because throughness is often thought of as a linear concept, instead of
the more classical interpretation. She explains: "All of
the energy of the horse goes through its back, over the withers, up
through the neck, and should then be recycled through the yielding and
softening of the horse back to the rider, so that the whole process may
start again without any interruption. This yielding involves the
submission of the horse, which involves bending every joint in his body
into a state of fluidity and softness so that all the energy comes full
circle. This bending includes the flexion through the poll, the jaw,
the articulation of the spine and, most importantly, all the joints of the
hind legs. In this way, the horse contains and retains his own
energy but allows the rider to make use of it."
A horse that
is through has a certain way of carrying himself. "He should
look soft and rounded through the back, not horizontal and rigid.
The tail should be dropping down nicely and swinging softly in time with
the hocks, which will be well engaged under the quarters," Sylvia
says.
A horse that
is truly through accepts and yields to the bit. "That makes the
rein look soft because the horse is so contained in his movements and so
incredibly channeled. [The movements have] lofty expression, airy,
almost like flying; not hard, thrusting--there's a big difference. I
want to see a horse looking like a bird--effortless, gliding,
soft."
To achieve
this softness, a rider must possess excellent timing. "When the
rider is in time with the horse, the rider is able to sustain the energy,
but without having to constrict at all; he knows when to give. Horse
and rider give back to each other. The energy is like this great
circle."
A horse that
is through will have an entirely different feeling that a horse who has
its energy blocked. "When you get real throughness and the
horse is more engaged behind with his weight in his quarters, the back and
the withers start to come up, an the shoulders start to become much more
high and light. The front legs suddenly become almost
airborne. You can really get good extension and collection.
The balance of the horse has changed, and once the horse is sitting more,
everything feels as if it is going uphill. You get much better trot
and canter because the forelegs are coming up more, and therefore are much
more expressive, but it is only because of the work of the hind
legs. When the hind legs step further under, with greater flexion in
the fetlock, hock, stifle, and hip joints, the feeling is quite
different. Because the horse is no longer balanced over the
forehand, he can become airborne," Sylvia says.
Channeling
The Energy
Once a horse gives his rider throughness, the rider must learn how to use
that energy. Unfortunately, many riders don't know how to change the
balance and contain the energy, and instead try to restrict the
front. Because riders are afraid they will lose control of the front
end, they block with their hands. The result is a loss of fluidity
and softness. "You don't have spontaneity. You have a
horse that looks as though it's kind of cramped in its movements,
overbent, tight, restricted. The restriction of the neck is
horrendous because a horse that's doing these maneuvers needs the balance
of the whole body. [The horse] should be given freedom in a
controlled way so that the energy of the horse can then be channeled by
the rider--not restricted. It's by channeling that you get the
movements--it's where you channel energy that creates impulsion."
Misinterpreting
throughness
The FEI rules, as well as the British, American and German rules, are
written with the correct intentions. The horse should sit on the
hocks, and the hind legs should be flexed and bent. The poll should
be the highest point and the neck should be rounded and flexed. Yet,
that's not always what we see in the ring. "We see a lot of
horses where the poll isn't the highest point, but instead the horse's
head is forced downwards and often pulled back towards the chest.
This is counterproductive to throughness and impulsion, and is a travesty
to the horse. Horses break down and they get back strain and tendon
strain. The head and neck in the incorrect position is the quickest
way to physically and mentally break down an animal.
"Throughness
is often misinterpreted for speed. I do not want to see a horse
looking like a steam engine with all of the pistons going. I hate to
see these riders' arms being pulled out by these massive horses.
Then it's all about strength. That's so primitive. It
shouldn't be about that. . . It should be about changing the balance and
establishing union. Many dressage judges will actually mark a horse
down if the line from the bit to the rider's hands does not look very taut
and tense. If they see any softness in the reins, they think the
horse is no longer through. It should be the opposite. The
horse should not be fighting against the rein. He should be coming
through, and giving back to the rider. That doesn't mean he comes
behind the bit; it just means he accepts the bit and he submits his entire
body to the riders aids."
The
So-Called Swinging Back
Sylvia believes that the term 'swinging back' also causes a lot of
confusion. Many people believe, when they see the muscles in the
horse's back and hind quarters bulging as he moves, that he is really
through and over his back. Is this really ideal? "You get
a huge amount of movement in the back when the horse is actually pushing
with the hind legs, but the hind legs aren't bending enough," Sylvia
explains. This is often accompanied by the horse's tail being held
straight away from his body instead of dropping naturally and
swinging. With a horse that is truly through, you won't see this
tail carriage or movement. The joints act as springs and shoudl be
absorbing this movement. "It's like a good dancer; there's a
huge amount of energy, but you don't see a lot of [muscle] movement.
The energy is flowing, but contained."
Before A
Horse Can Be Through
Throughness is the result of years of proper training. Before a
horse can be through and light, he ". . .must go forward with
confidence and have a little sense of collection." Until a
horse can shift his weight to his hindquarters, he cannot be through.
"You
cannot have throughness until the horse learns to take his weight and
balance his body back on his hind legs. Most people never teach the
horse how to transfer the weight to the hind leg. They start to
think about throughness when the horse is still on the forehand. And
if they do that, they'll never, ever get their horse off the
forehand. That is why we're seeing horses that are being restricted
in the front--because the rider never learned to teach the horse to bring
his hocks back, and to take his weight back.
"It's no
good just getting his hocks underneath; you've got to teach the horse to
spend more time on his hind legs than he does on his forelegs. Once
the horse is going forward, the most important step is teaching him to
transfer his weight from front to back. And once you've got
that--and that can take up to three years--then maybe you've got a bit of
time to start thinking about throughness," Sylvia reminds
riders.
If you try to
make your horse through before he has the skills, you risk confusing him
and ruining the training. "It's rather like giving a book to a
child and asking him to make something of it. Until the horse has
the tools, he cannot give the rider throughness."
Required
for riders
"Basically, I think the biggest problem today is people focusing
on how to improve their horses before they have learned their ABCs of
riding," Sylvia says. A rider must know how to sit, how to
apply the aids, and how the aids affect the horse and his
physiology. This takes years.
"If the
rider does not have a centered seat, he won't have the ability to lighten
the horse. The rider only needs to be tow inches out of synch, and
you can lose the balance of the horse in just one second. If you
don't find the center of the horse, and ride from a central position that
does not waver about, and don't know where to put your legs, it's almost
impossible to get the horse in that state of balance where you can make
him light."
Sylvia has
taught dressage riders all over the world, and has often found a lack of a
thorough understanding of the aids and how they affect the horse.
"You'd be amazed at how many dressage riders I run across who have
been riding for ten years and actually don't even know the the correct
aids for canter," she says.
Throughness
is a subject that sparks a lot of discussion and yet is always difficult
to apply to everyday training. It's frequently misunderstood and is
often confusing to many riders. A horse that is through will be
soft, round, and responsive. This is achieved by years of training
and requires a rider who is securely centered in his own balance.
And when all this comes together, the magic happens. With the horse'
s weight on his hind legs, he becomes almost airborne, flying like his
distant brother Pegasus. For Sylvia Loch, helping the horse capture
his nature under saddle is one of the joys of dressage. "If you
watch horses in flight, in their natural surroundings, they fly across the
landscape. It is upwards soaring power."
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