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Post by binky on Mar 12, 2017 6:39:37 GMT
Went to a dressage competition a couple of weeks ago with my youngster (4 and backed last summer) to do another dressage test. She was tense and hollow going round as it was a new venue but the test was completely accurate apart from two steps of jog when she should have been walking and our horses' length walk/trot/walk transition should probably have been a couple of steps longer. Judge gave us 42% and said we should have been in a rounder outline. This is our 4th test together and the other three tests scored in the low 60s when she was just as tense, if not more so. Is the judge correct to be looking for roundness at Intro?
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sarahp
Happy to help
Posts: 9,510
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Post by sarahp on Mar 12, 2017 8:28:28 GMT
I'm not a dressage judge, but competed a lot at lower levels and wrote for judges up to a much higher one, and have an interest in training horses. Tense and hollow is a fault in a test at any level, the judge can only judge what is in front of him/her and was doubtless looking for a softer, more relaxed outline rather than more collected. Lower level tests are more about helping the competitors to achieve a correct way of going for the future than for accuracy. I can't comment on the actual marks, or on those received in your previous tests - were they listed judges or not? The former have to learn to mark to a more consistent standard, but still each judge is different - I should know, I've written for masses of different ones! Did you look at the marks for the rest of the class to see if they were all low, it could have been a generally lo marking judge.
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Post by sageandonionagain on May 1, 2017 16:18:26 GMT
That was a pretty tough score. It isn't the lack of roundness that has caused you to lose marks though the just has put it that way (if its unaffiliated who knows what judges will say), but the tenseness causing your horse to hollow. Dressage is about harmony, rhythm and relaxation and if you are not able to display that, even at intro stage, to be honest there isn't much point in doing a test. Your test actually therefore wasn't accurate although you might have gone from marker to marker. Tenseness means your horse would not have been able to relax through the body and bend correctly. A tense horse or partnership does not score well.
May I suggest you do not do any more tests but concentrate on doing clinics or hiring venues to give your horse a little more experience and have some lessons at home and away. If your horse is tense, a competition environment makes it worse. There is little point doing a test until your horse is showing improvement.
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