2006 Global Dressage Forum

A Brief Review of the 2006 Global Dressage Forum

November 1, 2006 (full detailed report coming later this week)

Day One: Schmidt and Roberts Excite the Crowds

(Hooge Mierde – 30th October 2006) - The 2006 Global Dressage Forum, a two-day symposium for the elite of the dressage world, kicked off at Bartels Horse Academy in Hooge Mierde, The Netherlands, on October 30, 2006. It were the German Hubertus Schmidt and the American horse whisperer Monty Roberts who got the focus of the audience of international dressage riders, trainers, owners, and journalists the most with their elaborate demonstrations on day one.

After a word of welcome from international trainer and IDTC spokesman David Hunt and former British Olympian Richard Davison, German Olympic team member Hubertus Schmidt took the microphone as he was asked to explain his training methods. In the wake of the still raging debate on classical dressage versus the Sjef Janssen/Dutch training system based on the rollkur, Schmidt came to Holland to demonstrate classical dressage. Having trained over 30 Grand Prix horses in his career, Schmidt is the most prolific dressage rider and trainer in the world. At the Forum, Schmidt showed his techniques aboard a world class dressage horse, the 7-year old Rhinelander gelding Furst Fabio (by Fidermark x Worldchamp), who is owned by Colombian rider Dr. Cesar Parra. Hubertus stressed the importance of a correct warm up in which looseness and suppleness have to be obtained with the achievement of “schwung” as goal. Schmidt’s pointed out that the horse has to get a light contact with the bit and stretch into it at all times.

The second speaker of the day was the Dutch sports psychologist Dr. Rico Schuijers who generated great interaction with his audience by asking the spectators to do concentration exercises. He showed them useful techniques to acquire the right frame of mind and concentration for a competition. Dutch team member Laurens van Lieren as well as Olympic archery medallist Wietse van Alten demonstrated certain relaxation and focal strategies to come into the right frame of mind for competitions.

The first day at the 2006 Global Dressage Forum closed with an exhilarating demonstration by the legendary Monty Roberts. The American horse whisperer Roberts spoke for the first time at a dressage forum and showed the importance of trust and communication with the horse in order to achieve a positive relationship with it. Besides displaying footage of his work with wild Mustangs, Roberts showed video clips of cruel techniques used world wide to saddle break horses. Roberts put his horse whispering language “Equus” to practice by working on the scene with a spooky Dutch warmblood mare which he turned in 30 minutes into an obedient and sweet horse that easily loaded up in a trailer after having been ‘schooled’ with Roberts’ techniques of “join-up” (create a bond with the horse via trust) and “follow-up” (the horse trusts his handlers and follows him everywhere without fear).

Day Two: Heated Discussions at the 2006 Global Dressage Forum

(Hooge Mierde – 31st October 2006) - The second day of the 2006 Global Dressage Forum was filled with excitement and for the first time in years, an almost real discussion on the future of the dressage sport took place.

The day started with a very smooth clinic of the Australian zoologist Andrew McLean, who explained equine psychology. The horse’s ‘thinking’ process is heavily influenced by their natural instinct to flee. Dressage riders mainly apply operant conditioning by positively reinforcing their horse. McLean demonstrated his theory by working Imke Schellekens’ young stallion Aachen (by Arpeggio) in-hand. The rambunctious young colt was very naughty in hand and McLean showed that by telling the horse to rein back each time he wants to go forward, you give a clear signal to him that he has to wait for your sign to move.

The 2006 forum was smooth sailing until McLean’s speech finished. The audience and discussion panels had been lulled to sleep with interesting sessions on equine behaviour, but little did they really contribute to the advancement of the sport. This changed during the session in which FEI Dressage Committee chairman Mariette Withages reviewed the 2006 World Equestrian Games. She allowed the audience to judge the Grand Prix Special test of Mexican Bernadette Pujals, Danish Andreas Helgstrand and German Isabell Werth. Each movement and its score were publicly discussed and the audience finally got the opportunity to voice their opinion on why they did not agree with the judges’ marks. Especially, Matine’s poor trot work and Satchmo going behind the vertical and not pushing enough from behind were movements the audience considered overscored by the judges.

Furthermore, Withages stated that for the first time “the press had no complaints about the judging”. A Belgian journalist refuted that and pointed out that American combination Brentina/McDonald was severely overscored (71.417% - 9th place) for their Grand Prix ride in which the horse was lame. The discussion panel of judges, sitting at the forum, was awestruck and had difficulties explaining this floated score. Stephen Clarke stated that the mare was only “slightly irregular” but overall no judge at the forum provided a decent explanation for Brentina’s high score. The American delegation of spectators and journalists at the forum did not agree with the journalist’s standpoint, but international riders such as Kyra Kyrklund and Anky van Grunsven applauded her comment. Unfortunately, moderator Richard Davison nipped the whole heated debate on politics in judging in the bud by stating that lunch was served.

The final session of the day was on coaching and hyperflexion. Dr. Rene van Weeren discussed his observations on his scientific research studying the low-deep and round (LDR) head position of the horse. So far he has come to the conclusion that from a biomechanical viewpoint there is no reason to contest this method (LDR/Rollkur/Hyperflexion). Sjef Janssen spoke about how he motivated and trained Anky van Grunsven and his lacklustre and uninspired speech was followed by a training demonstration in which Van Grunsven rode Painted Black in the rollkur position.

After her short demo, van Grunsven and her coach Janssen were brought to the podium to take questions from the audience and to talk about their riding techniques with a panel that included Dr. Hillary Clayton, Kyra Kyrklund and St Georg journalist Kerstin Niemann. The latter was unable to either represent or defend her magazine’s viewpoint on the rollkur and was publicly butchered by a rude Janssen, who refused to talk to the two present German journalists at a 'forum', and an aggressive but correct Van Grunsven.

The absence of the top German dressage riders and trainers and the 2006 Global Dressage Forum was very striking and a great pity as this Janssen/AVG session had the potential to become a really interesting debate on top level dressage training. Unfortunately, it stuck to one-way traffic with little to no decent discussion on the effects of the LDR training method and how judges rate the final result of this training in the show ring.

A more detailed report is coming soon

Text and Photos copyrighted: Astrid Appels / Eurodressage