Dressage for the neck reining horse

Peeperpuppy · Dressage for the neck reining horse

How difficult is it for a horse who is trained to do neck reining to go back & forth between neck reining & the direct contact needed to do dressage?

Julie

should not be difficult at all. We do the opposite - train dressage then change to neck reining when tentpegging and re enactment.

Peeperpuppy

Thanks for the response Julie. Years ago, I rode horses for other people. I rode in shows. I exercised horses & kind of became a jack of all trades. Those were either horses trained to high levels by other people or horses I started for them. I always started out training with contact & building fitness and suppling, etc.. then as the horse evolved through our process (Grandpa's & mine) we began teaching neck reining.

My own horses that I started can go back with no problems but my husband's worried if I do dressage with his mare (who's a very good neck reiner) that it will 'un-train' her). I think he's more worried that he'll have to start riding with contact & that's not his thing. My husband rides on a loose rein. Period. So I wanted to get opinions because I don't want to get this wrong & have the mare completely confused.

Julie, the reinactment stuff always looks like so much fun! My old Percheron mare was trained to do live theatre reinactments. She was one of the horses they used to reinact jousting matches. Unfortuantely the owner of the troupe became ill, had to sell out, & the mare went into the wrong hands so when I got her she had baggage however I triggered some of her earliest training while playing with her & she could do some neat things... though I'm glad she never reared up & such with me ON her back. She did help me send the neighbor's bull home once & she was purely fierce

Julie

I have a good friend who rides western - she is the only person I know who does actually, but she also wins at dressage - if she is entered, everyone else may as well go home! The main difference seems to be that the horse moves in a different way, the hindquarters are more engaged and the horse tracks up behind more with dressage. As she takes a contact her horse lifts and engages her back end more. She has an incredibly light contact, just a touch. Also if I remember she spent some time asking the horse to bend the correct way through her neck.

The minute she is out trail riding or racing in gymkhanas - she is neck reining though!

PasoBaby_CarolU

I kind of do it all with my horses, direct rein, indirect rein, ride with carrot sticks and no reins. They do fine.

What I have found though is that if a horse is used to contact and trained with it, they often feel unconfident without it. So, it's a good idea to mix it up early and often, not wait 4-5 years until you have a fully trained dressage horse and then suddenly throw the reins away.