Kat & Dream Girl score high point at second level and high point at third level as a junior against adult amateurs and professionals with a 71.75% at third at Greater Atlanta Dressage Southern in Conyers, GA. Photo by Meg McGuire
Kat & Consent making their first debut together at 2020 WEF 6 World Champion Hunter Spectacular.
At home, USEF Young Horse & Grand Prix Dressage Champion Jason Canton has been teaching Kat flat work on her hunters since 2016. He decided Kat should have a dressage horse and traveled to Holland and found Kat’s PSG/I-1 champion Dream Girl this past winter. By July 2020, and after two dressage competitions with scores in the 70s, including 74% at First Level Three. Kat was ranked fourth by USEF for the FEI Children’s Dressage Championship qualifier, qualified for USDF Regional Championships and earned her USDF bronze medal at showing first, second & third levels. Kat says, “While some people think I got my medal in a short time, I have been riding all my life so it really took more like ten years. Jason has been teaching me basic dressage for years. He picked out a super mare for me to show. We are all three in tune with each other for success.”
Talking Kat...
My flatwork makes me a better rider with my hunters, AND my jumping skills make me a very brave dressage rider. Mainly, the biggest difference is working the horse to be more collected and uphill in the dressage. The hunters go more flat but more forward to the jumps. People ask me all the time how my flatwork helps my hunters, here are a couple things I’ve learned. Four Key Training Exercises I use.
LEG YIELDING
I go in both trot and canter down the quarter line and leg yield to the wall or fence line to get the horse off my leg and make him more responsive to each leg and each direction. As I’m going to a jump, and if I’m not centered, I can just leg yield over easily to the middle of the jump. There are 8-10 jumps in a course. The judges pay attention
to that in their overall scoring. I hope to be consistent to each jump to win a class. It’s a little thing that can make the score go up even if you have a great jumping hunter.
COLLECTING & LENGTHENING
When I’m on the long side of the ring I do ask the horse to go more forward and then when I get to the short side I collect the stride. I sit into the saddle and have a little more rein pressure. But I have to make sure I have more leg and have twice the leg pressure than hand. I don’t want the horse to think backwards going with too much hand. It helps me when I’m in the show ring if there is a line that is forward going or short. I can know how to adjust the stride to get the correct amount of strides to the jump. If I’m more forward, I don’t have to add a stride. If the line is short then that means I need to collect the horse to get less strides in. The course requires a certain amount of strides and you’re judged on whether you did that or not.
BENDING
In both trot and canter, I do a 20 meter circle, spiraling in and out with the horse being around my inside leg. I incorporate the leg yielding to the spiral in exercise, with my outside leg. Then I use my inside leg to spiral out. This teaches my horses to be able to bend through a tight turn. I use it in a handy course when you have to do a roll back. This helps keep the horses in balance and in rhythm. If you just turn the horse’s head, it could result in a bad jump because you are not balanced and straight. Again, scores go up if you prepare your horses to jump well.
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