Notes from Charles de Kunffy Clinic: Training Principles

[piedmontfields]

Preparing the horse for work: We start with limbering up. Mostly this is walking, then easy trot and canter. Then we move to warming up, adding 10 meter circles and changes in the length of stride and changes of bend. Change is your friend in training. Then add the lateral work. Be slow, but busy and well cadenced as you increase engagement and move more towards collection. Think about how much crossing of the hind leg you ask for---the greater the cross, the greater the challenge.

Repetition is useful and helps a horse. Don't always push first with a whip.

Have a teaching attitude, not a fighting attitude.

A whip is a supplement and a support to the leg aids.

When you need to make a correction, the seat is the authority--not the hands.

If the horses head come up, the outside rein must give---to give the horse room to work in the movement. If the head comes up, the outside rein empties. We don't correct head tossing with the reins. You ride forward and give the horse the ability to become an athlete.

We welcome everything the horse does. We accept that it wasn't a perfect walk-canter--but we mark it in our minds and pay attention. We ask the horse "How much will you do for us?" Horse replies, "very little!". We say "Fine!".

The right hind leg on every horse is always stickier and stiffer. So exercises relying on the right hind to weight may cause head raising and struggle. Coach your horse through that.

Inside leg: Asks for energy
Outside leg: Closes the horse behind

To make a point to a horse, add some speed (this is very natural to horses as it suggest they should pay attention and get away/get going).

Overall, though, slow the horse in training (you can speed up in competition if necessary). The slow work teaches collection and builds strength. Training is a means to an end (everyone wants to ride the end!). But the way to engagement is slowing down.

Collections freedom and amplification in a different balance.

Picking up the reins should be like a secret: The horse shouldn't know that it is happening.

As you develop the horse, you will go from plateau to plateau. First you make sure you can maintain at a new plateau and then you go on. When you are harmonious with your horse, it is a sign that the horse is ready for the next challenge. The benefit for the development of the horse is in change.

Real horsemanship transforms a horse as beast of burden into a work of art: Horses who are developed move better, look better, are pain-free and are stable.

We in classical horsemanship are in an art so complex that when we understand the ideals, we realize we will never reach the ideals. But it is our compass. It tells us that is the way to go.

Horses have 3 escapes: Speed, crookedness and retreating behind or going above the bit. If you permit these escapes, the horse escapes working muscles, joints and ligaments. Horses don't have the natural instinct or will to engage. So our training system fights these escapes. If you don't have control of the hind legs, you will break down your horse. Ex. in piaffe, the horse's escapes are conquered. Remember, horses are claustrophobic---they don't like to be confined.

A horse lacks logic and analysis. You as a rider always need to be ready to "go back to where we were" and pick up the thread of training. This is why we jealousy guard the attention of the horse.

The horse knows how to make himself comfortable. When a horses tosses his head or explodes into an unrequested gait, the horse is just trying to make himself comfortable. They do this all the time in the pasture, in the stall. It is nature's way of undoing tension or a muscle spasm.

When the poll is up and the face is vertical, the nostrils of the horse are below the eyeballs. You cannot amplify the gaits if the horse is behind the vertical.

[musical comedy]

Thank you Piedmont. You always to a stellar job with the notes.

[piedmontfields]

You are welcome. More to come, perhaps this weekend. I'm thinking the other themes are Exercises for Addressing the Horse's Needs and Case Studies.

[demi]

Great notes. I printed these out, too.
I love the quiet rhythm that Charles teaches with. It's meditative. His instruction is clear and to the point so that the rider becomes clear to his horse. And the horse becomes quiet and focused.
It makes me want to go out and ride.

[Abby Kogler]

Lovely! Thank you for taking the time to post these notes.

I have been lucky to audit clinics with Charles since ever, since he lived in the San Diego area for years and years. I have not yet ridden in one and I hope he keeps well so that I will be able to fulfill that bucket list item. I admire his writing and his teaching style very much Your notes correspond with mine through the years and I can just hear his voice saying these things.

Thanks again.

[piedmontfields]

I'm glad the notes are reminding you of Charles. I had only been introduced to him through his writing and through JJ Tate's teaching before. He is a master teacher and the content of what he teaches is essential IMO to quality dressage training and development (rider and horse).

[Tsavo]

The right hind leg on every horse is always stickier and stiffer. So exercises relying on the right hind to weight may cause head raising and struggle. Coach your horse through that.

This is an interesting use of words.

He is describing a RH that is WEAKER, as opposed to stiffer as far as I know. My horse will sometimes not engage the RH in the identical manner he is describing but I would say that is because it is weak and my horse tries not to let it take all the weight at first. Stiffer connotes shorter but instead of shorter, my horse will carry the RH slightly out to the side if left to his own devices.

I would say my horse's LH is stiffer than the right as a reaction to taking incrementally more weight some of the time.

Not sure about these descriptions. I once asked one of my trainers to define the difference between weak and stiff on the hinds but I have largely forgotten what she said. She did agree my horse was weak on the RH and stiff on the LH. These asymmetries do not rise to the level of unevenness... it is just the feel and the amount of aiding to get engagement/bend and lateral movement equal in both directions.

[piedmontfields]

Yes, it was interesting that Charles used the word "stiffer" and "stickier" for the weaker right hind. He clearly meant weaker, too. But it is the hind that is less willing to bearing weight, getting under the body, or reaching as high (ex. in passage).

As an aside, of course there are horses who are the opposite (stronger right hind, weaker left hind---and usually hollow left and stiff right)---but most horses are the other way.

[Chisamba]

The stiffer leg is usually the stronger leg, the weaker leg is generally more supple. This is generally understood in understanding of biomechanics.

Strength reduces flexibility.

[Tsavo]

The stiffer leg is usually the stronger leg, the weaker leg is generally more supple. This is generally understood in understanding of biomechanics.

Strength reduces flexibility.

I agree with this analysis.

[piedmontfields]

FWIW, I don't think Charles was teaching otherwise---it is just that the weaker leg could also be described as stiff in terms of range of motion and weight bearing. Just language.