{"id":55820,"date":"2020-09-12T17:12:55","date_gmt":"2020-09-12T07:12:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/?p=55820"},"modified":"2024-09-10T13:29:32","modified_gmt":"2024-09-10T03:29:32","slug":"carl-hester-and-peter-holler-on-judging-young-horse-classes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/2020\/09\/carl-hester-and-peter-holler-on-judging-young-horse-classes\/","title":{"rendered":"Carl Hester and Peter Holler on judging young horse classes"},"content":{"rendered":"

Carl Hester, trainer and rider, \u00a0and Peter Holler, judge, on what they look for in Young Horse Classes\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

When Carl, and German judge, Peter Holler, commented on the top combinations in the Young Horse classes the Brisbane Dressage Festival, the tone, I am sorry to inform you dear reader, is the same old, same old, and it all starts with the Training Principles \u2013 and the first of those, relaxation:<\/p>\n

Carl told the audience:<\/em><\/h1>\n

\u201cIf they don\u2019t have relaxation it affects their paces. Some horses can be tense and produce spectacular movement, but that\u2019s not right either. Others go into themselves. You just have to think of the Training Scale, how the horse uses itself. Look to the head and neck, if the neck is not nodding outwards, the horse cannot be supple in its back. If they nod inwards it shows they are tight in their back.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Quadriga Galicia and Marcela Adkins<\/em><\/p>\n

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Peter Holler (on left) part of the Judging Commission at the greatest young horse show of all, the Bundeschampionat<\/em><\/p>\n

Peter Holler stressed: \u201cIn the trot we are looking for a natural, not an extended or suspended step in trot. Just a clear two beat and just two or three longer steps. Are they willing to go forward? Do they stay supple and rideable?\u201d<\/p>\n

Carl tells us he asked Peter Holler, who judges young horse classes frequently in Europe:<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat is the most important thing the movement or the temperament? <\/em><\/p>\n

His emphasis was on a natural moving horse not an over-produced one.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Emma Flavelle-Watts and San Fama<\/em><\/p>\n

Fairly soon, Carl demonstrated how willing he was to use the leg yield. Pointing to the way the horses tended to lean on the rider\u2019s inside leg \u2013 particularly when they were on their difficult rein \u2013 he suggested a few steps of leg yield to get the horse around the leg and stop them getting hollow backed in the transition.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Highfields Bella Vista and Deborah Oliver<\/em><\/p>\n

And as always, Carl was supportive of the riders. It was not the end of the world if they hadn\u2019t got big marks at this show: \u201cA four-year-old is a dream, and the future is in the work, it\u2019s not always the horse you buy, it\u2019s the work you put in. One thing we can\u2019t tell from the outside is what it feels like. Just because it doesn\u2019t get the scores, doesn\u2019t mean it is not a Grand Prix horse. What you feel is important, if you can influence the horse, and if it is a worker, that is very important, the scores are not the end of it all.\u201d<\/p>\n

When the five-year-olds entered the arena, Judge Holler emphasised that \u201ca little mistake is okay, we are looking for potential not perfection.\u201d<\/p>\n

And Carl took up the riff: \u201cIf we have two tests, one mistake free, but with no quality, and one with quality but the horse makes mistakes, the quality should come out on top.\u201d<\/p>\n

And the leg yields had become a little more sophisticated now: \u201cWhen you sit and ride leg yield, look at the horse\u2019s ears. You can tell if the tips of the ears are level. If it tips its neck, you can tell it is not supple to that side and that makes the neck twist. Adjust the head, inside hand higher, lower, it is a stiffness \u2013 the horse is not being bad, but you have to dwell on it and fix the stiffness.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the six-year-olds, Peter Holler was a bit disappointed with the walks:<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want to see the ability to shorten, not high in the poll and very collected, just that they stay quick enough behind and in good rhythm. None of these horses would score over 8 for walk, they are not really Young Horse walks, they are Grand Prix walks, and they lose the suppleness.\u201d<\/h1>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Remi Downunder and Emma Flavelle Watts show off their birthday trick<\/em><\/p>\n

And, of course, as a sixth birthday present the horse gets a stab at the dreaded flying change. Here Carl thought part of the problem came from the rider\u2019s legs: \u201cRiders in the tests couldn\u2019t get the leg on because the horses knew what is coming. Try and keep the canter smaller, and instead of surprising the horse by putting on the leg, keep the leg on. Little canter with the leg closed.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

San Fama and Emma Flavelle-Watts<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cWhy is the canter so important? If your ambition is Grand Prix, look at the judges\u2019 sheet and see how many canter movements there are. The other paces are important, but canter is the most important.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Remi Downunder and Emma, owned by Hope Beerling<\/em><\/p>\n

And the horses were not going to be allowed to leave the arena until they really let go and stretched: \u201cThe main thing is to leave the arena relaxed, you can only finish when the horse is relaxed, if it is tense, then keep going until they will relax.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Breeding a young horse star in Australia? Go to www.ihb.com.au and select from the range of top \u00a0stallions for your mare:<\/h2>\n

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Image Maker<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Barbarossa<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Carl Hester, trainer and rider, \u00a0and Peter Holler, judge, on what they look for in Young Horse Classes\u00a0 When Carl, and German judge, Peter Holler, commented on the top combinations in the Young Horse classes the Brisbane Dressage Festival, the tone, I am sorry to inform you dear reader, is the same old, same old, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":55831,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[81,4],"tags":[953,2095,100],"class_list":["post-55820","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-breaking-news","category-dressage","tag-carl-hester","tag-peter-holler","tag-young-horse-classes"],"acf":[],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55820","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55820"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55820\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":68362,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55820\/revisions\/68362"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55831"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55820"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55820"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55820"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}