Have any of you heard of Judge My Ride?
If not, it's a website that judges the form of rider and horse. I understand this is a great tool for all you equitation/hunter riders out there, but I just don't understand why you jumper riders out there are sending in your pics/videos in to get judged?!?!?!? Honestly, it seems to me if you are a "jumper" and are sending in pics/ videos of yourself, you really are not a jumper rider. To me, if you are a true jumper rider, meaning that's all you do, it doesn't matter what you look like, as long as you help your horse jump great and that you get the job done.On another random, but related topic, I really don't agree with every trainers' philosophy that you have to bring young riders up through hunters, then equitation, and then finally jumpers. I don't think hunters and equitation prepares our young riders for the quite difficult task of grand prix jumping. hunters and equitation teaches our riders today to sit still, smile for the camera, and look pretty. While that's perfectly acceptable for those two disciplines, a jumper has to be fighting to get over every single fence in that show ring, and another HUGE thing you must learn to do which is EXTREMELY difficult, is to get your horse to travel from his hawks/back end. that is where all the power comes from and that is what allows your horse to jump those huge fences. Most americans have never heard of this in their lives! I know i was never taught this in all the barns i've been in throughout the years. Only when I started training with John, did I learn that I couldn't just let my horse be all strung out and on his front end, that I had to get them on their hawks in order to jump those 5 foot fences. And now what I know to look for, its so easy to see that almost all americans' horses are strung out and not on their back ends, and the germans on the other hand, have their horses so nicely framed and on their hind ends and they have so much power that they don't have to run at every fence. they just canter nicely with power! I'm going to put two videos for you to watch and hopefully you'll see what i've explained. the first video will be a german rider and the second will be an american rider. enjoy : )
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LyduGUDoDg8&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tXdW2MoKetw
