So western pleasure sorta scares me.

[Celtic Hill]

So yeah, like the subject says, I know that sounds weird.

I rode western pleasure for 4 years and still have been just not at the same caliber. When I first started riding I rode QHs (Western Pleasure) my trainer had shown up and down eastern side of the us showing, she even had some horses go to the world show and win. Any ways, im at the point where I can get on a western horse and ride it, and ride it well. (that's what 4 years does to you

) please don't think im big headed and trying to sound like a trainer, I just have had a lot of experience. Any ways, I stopped riding western pleasure seriously when I first got my first and switched to dressage. Any ways to make a long story short, I went 4 years riding WP on and off again.

Now that I have my own horse I have been kinda schooling towards a versatility competition where you ride both western and english. Granted my mare is an irish sport horse and I dont expect to win, but i just want to have fun. Any ways, I have been thinking a lot about how im going to work with Fee for western with out screwing up her training, any ways i figured that out, but it got me thinking.

Western pleasure (with QHs, Apps, and Paints) needs an intervention! Like, it's ridiculous, horses on the forehand, they still haven't really gotten away from that 4 beat lope, im not going to lie, its fun to ride to, but it really screws up a horse. My freind has an 18 y.o. horse that was a big name QH barn and clearly had some western training, but she can't collect up and get her legs underneath her to thrust her forward, she's always on the forehand. I don't even call a QH lope a lope, I call it a Broken Lope because that's what it is, if you watch the horse isn't working together, its like in two parts.

It also scares me how they get horses to put their heads down, draw reins, curb bits. I think they have a place, but most the time they are used incorrectly. The trainer I used to ride with had this gadget that ran from the girth through the bit and to the back rings on the saddle. Now when you tie horses head down and then expect them to canter it's not going to happen... The horse has to be able to lift it's head and shoulder up so it can collect it's self. <--- Common sense here people!!!

I don't understand why people think this is natural. Can't they take some notes from morgan and arab riders who's horses are actually collected and have a real lope!?

I think the joging speed is fine but the head carriage needs to come up so the horse can track up, and they need to learn what a collected canter is... because that is what a lope is, a slow canter, which is a collected canter is with collection.

I guess I am going to step off my soap box.

Oh and here is a link for people who don't know what im talking about.

 

[welsummerchicks]

I have to agree. Since the day I was sentient to such things(far scar and twenty YARS ago), they have been saying they are going to make it more normal, and it just has not happened. About every twenty years I hear someone say, 'oh it's SOOOOO much better than it used to be'.

Nah.

 

[Sir Birdaholic]

I could see me working cattle on an English saddle.

Sorry, just a picture that popped into my head.

 

[Celtic Hill]

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Yeah that might not work out so well, i mean if you had a dressage saddle it could work, but watch out for those big cantles.... Not fun!

 

[Celtic Hill]

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It's sooo stupid, because I WP just not with QH ne more because I can't deal with that lope.

 

[rodriguezpoultry]

If it's any consolation, I rode Max for the FIRST time in a show. He was barely trained for western pleasure and has a higher head-set than what is seen as "normal". His natural gait is slow and easy and it's fun to ride without hurting your rear from busting your butt. He got 2nd place out of the class.

Talk about shocked! That was one show though...the next show we went to he had 2 speeds. Walk and Stop. It was not a pleasant day...anyway, maybe some of the judges are leaning more towards the natural way?

 

[welsummerchicks]

Not work cattle in an English saddle? That's essentially what the Australians do.

THe 'English saddle' that seems so possible is the very flat close contact saddle, also exaggerated, and puts the rider too far back on the horse's loins.

I think many of our American division classes have gotten too exaggerated and unnatural looking. We're so used to looking at them that many times, we don't even see it. The exaggerated and unnatural looks 'natural' if you see it often enough.

For some reason, we just seem to have that tendency overall. To exaggerate. We get too far away from the origins of the style, and get too 'horse showy'.

Ten horses in a ring, all nice, so the guy who wins is the one who exaggerates something. 'More is better'. No it isn't.

Hunters - too low in the neck and unbalanced and slow, reins too loose and long, could not survive, stay on its feet or keep up in a fox hunt over rough ground, would fall on its face. Can you take that style and go out and be safe in the hunt field or on the eventing course - nope, not and ride at a useful pace. That's how people crash and burn.

Western pleasure, ditto, could not survive as a working ranch horse - head too low, reins too loose and long, that walk, jog and lope, you could never get any work done on a ranch having a horse go that way.

Even reining, I think the balance looks very unnatural and not practical for the great outdoors. We've bred horses to have exaggerated unbalanced conformation in order to go that way.

I think the posture of the Doma Vaquero horse looks a lot more practical, and a lot more like a working ranch horse. A little exaggerated today, but in twenty years, yes, it will look nuts too.

Tennessee Walking big lick classes...no comment. Just no comment.

 

[Celtic Hill]

I think the most exaggerated of disciplines we have is TWH, let's not go there.

And I agree with Welsummer, Vaquero are pretty awesome.

Oh and I think there are very few people that respect the curb bit. Curb bits can do so much to a horse! I took fee out in my single gointed western curb bit and I was riding her in it and it was the first time in a while and I was riding her like I normally would, next thing I knew she was way behind the vertical really giving into my hands, so I automatically loosened my reins. It' just scares me what people could be doing out there with their horses.

 

[michickenwrangler]

I don't bother sitting through the western classes at the county fair unless someone I know is riding in them. Actually, at the county fairs, the only difference between English and Western is the saddle and outfits. Same horses, same dumped over gaits, same riders trying to have a fashion show on horseback. And yet I'm the snob and nut for distance riding.

The Arab and Saddlebred worlds in saddleseat have gotten very bad too. Bad thing is, the saddleseat world has spilled over into hunter pleasure, show hack and costume so that only Park horses place (regardless of USEF standards) so that the AHA had to create a separate "Sport Horse" division for horses true to the standard. Former hunter pleasure horses are now showing in Sport Horse Under Saddle and dressage style horses are now going into Sport Horse Show Hack versus the old show hack.

 

[michickenwrangler]

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I ride at a TWH barn and the organization they belong to the National Walking Horse Association NWHA was created to counter the horrific practices. All horses are inspected before classes and none of the built up shoes or soring is allowed. They are strongest in the Midwest (unfortunately a lot of southern trainers still do all the bad stuff) but it is nice seeing natural TWHs compete