what is dressage?

In simple terms dressage is the French term for Dressing/training horses and a dressed horse is nothing more than a trained horse. The interesting part is that until the introduction of dressage sport in the Olympics of 1912, Dressage or the Dressing of horses was reserved mostly for the military and royalty.

Today, just a century later there seems to be a great distinction between classical Dressage, or classical riding and modern or competition dressage. Modesty and Humility that often accompanied skill and mastery of the riders of the past is in recent times absent and almost non existent, being replaced by arrogance, indifference and ego. Not by the true masters, but by those who feel superior to all others.

Any horse, doesn't matter what kind of horse it is, can be a dressage horse. It all depends on, what exactly each rider prefers. That also means that any horse of any breed can benefit from the classical training principles. In recent times, most riders prefer the horses with lots of movement, and even are often times prejudice against horses with a lack of extension or suspension in the trot. True an extended trot looks very spectacular when performed under an expert rider but lets not forget about other movements like, the pirouette or zigzag half pass. After all, aren't these movements also part of competition?

What ever the case, all horses can be training horses, or dressage horses. All horses should in my opinion be trained in the classical form. Only in this way can the horse be fully transformed and then directed with ease in any discipline, sport or job the rider has to offer. Dressage still means training today as it did in older times, we as human beings have made a new meaning for Dressage as a form of riding sport, that resembles but not always matches classical riding the way it was intended to. When you hear a person saying, "this horse has dressage movement" or "this is a dressagy horse" or "this is not a dressage horse" they are usually talking about the sport of competitive dressage, the horse's natural suspended movement at the trot, conformation qualities, or don't truly understand the original meaning of the word.

In some countries Spain and Mexico for example, every riding style has a "Doma" in front of it. Doma, being the Spanish word for Dressage, refers to the different riding or training styles, such as Doma Americana (reining/western riding), Doma or Rienda Charra (Mexican Charro/Mexican Cowboy riding), Doma Gaucha (Argentinian riding style), Doma Vaquera(Spanish Cowboy Dressage), Domado en Alta Escuela (Trained to High School).


visit my website at: http://classicalspanishequitation.weebly.com