I love dressage and want to train my horse to do piaffe and passage. We are already competing at Elementary level, and my instructor says that she will try and help from the ground, but I wondered if you had any specific advice.
Answered by Bronwen Meredith, Grand Prix dressage rider
I can completely understand your desire to start riding the higher-level movements, and I can tell you that the feeling of those movements is incredible. However, it is absolutely vital that you do not train these movements too early. Horses need a huge amount of strength to be able to execute these advanced movements and performing them too early is dangerous for the health and wellbeing of your horse.
Piaffe and passage originate from a progression of difficulty of movement starting with the trot. You gradually collect the trot more and more until you train half-steps into the trot. You then continue to collect until ultimately you achieve a few steps of the movement at a time. Finally, you increase the number of steps and only then do you begin to ask for more elevation and more elasticity.
However, even in a very strong horse who is ready for these movements, the teaching process can be long, and you need expert advice about how to execute them. Getting these movements wrong can cause serious harm to your horse. Reading books to find out about the classical aids is great, but ultimately you and your horse need to be ready both physically and mentally. Applying the aids and using a whip from the ground may elicit something resembling passage or piaffe, but unless you and your horse know what you are doing, and are both skilled and strong enough, I can almost guarantee your piaffe and passage are good imitations, not the real deal. Outside of your and your horse’s experience, it is also vital for these higher-level movements that you work with an instructor who is very familiar with the movements and has ridden them or taught them before.
Progression through the dressage levels can feel slow, but with good reason. The tests are there to teach you and the horse the movements in the order that you should learn them, and it should take you years to get to Grand Prix level. Attempting movements earlier than you should can cause serious physical damage to your horse, and also build unpleasant associations for your horse, as he is asked to do something he is simply not capable of.
My advice to you is to keep working at Elementary, and gradually climb through the levels. This way you will learn everything at the right time, in the right way and with the right understanding. If you are desperate to feel the movements, the best option is to try and have a lesson on a top dressage horse, but please do not think that you can then go home and ask your horse to do the movements. I promise you that your patience will pay off!
Note: If someone is going to help you from the ground with the advanced movements, they need to be very experienced and wear a helmet and body protector. Too many people have been seriously injured trying to ‘teach’ piaffe and passage from the ground.