Working Equitation: The story of riding something new, Spanish style!

Stephanie Hayes, returning guest and founder for the Center of America's First Horse describes an exciting new sport - Working Equitation.  This fun competition honors the traditional riding style of southern Europe. Think a mix of dressage, working cattle, and speed trail!  Correct riding and balance are the key, and you don't need a fancy Spanish horse to get started.

Working Equitation

Transcript

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Kris Hiney: Welcome to extension horses, tack, box, talk series horse stories with a purpose. I'm your host, Dr. Kris Hiney, with Oklahoma State University. And today we're going to be talking about a horse sport that probably many of you have not heard of. So we're going to have a returning guest, Stephanie Hayes, who is the founder of Center for America's 1st horse we visited with her about Spanish barbs, and this

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Kris Hiney: discipline ties right into these Spanish horses. And that's working equitation. So welcome back to the program, Stephanie.

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Stephanie Hayes: Thank you. Glad to be here.

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Kris Hiney: So I, I actually love this topic because I literally stumbled across some Youtube videos of these competitions because I always like to try to put different horse sports in my newsletters

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Kris Hiney: and saw these. And I was like, this is super cool, because it's like when people think about equitation. I think they think like, Oh, we go around the ring and do the pattern. No, this is nothing like that. So tell us a little bit about what working equitation is because it's super exciting.

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Stephanie Hayes: Yeah, it's really cool. And I love to be able to share about it because it is

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Stephanie Hayes: I think it. It might be the fastest growing discipline in the Us. Right now, but it's still so small. So the history of working equitation is rooted in Southern Europe. The countries of France.

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Stephanie Hayes: Italy.

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Stephanie Hayes: Portugal, and Spain held their 1st competition in the mid 19 nineties, and it's been here in the US. Mostly on the West Coast for maybe close to 20 years. It was established to showcase the training and

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Stephanie Hayes: athleticism and the relationship that a rider would need with their horse to work cattle, Southern European style, with a big, long pole called a Garoccia, not like with a rope like we use here in this country.

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Stephanie Hayes: and it was a way for

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Stephanie Hayes: for them to showcase their Iberian horses. The you know what agile, wonderful athletes that the Lusitanos and Andalusians are.

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Stephanie Hayes: and the sport spread to different countries. It is comprised of 4 different trials. The 1st is a dressage test which would look like a standard USDF test, but it's a little bit different.

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Stephanie Hayes: The scoring is the same, the sheets look the same, but the movements would be different than what you may have in some dressage tests. The second trial is called ease of handling.

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Stephanie Hayes: and that's an obstacle course. There's obstacles that would represent something you may see out working in the field, or a skill that your horse would need to work cattle.

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Kris Hiney: The 3rd phase is the speed trial, where it's yeah. I've seen.

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Stephanie Hayes: Yeah, that's probably what you've seen. It's very exciting. In the speed trial. If you think of a jump off

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Stephanie Hayes: you're making tighter circles, smaller turns, shorter lines, really? You know, having a lot of adjustability with your horse, but the speed round

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Stephanie Hayes: should still have a flavor of good horsemanship.

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Stephanie Hayes: balance, rhythm, timing. It's not. It's not a Gym khana. It's not a free for all Yahoo horsemanship goes out the window. If you watch those videos, you'll see that these horses are so balanced in in these very small turns and changes of lead every 2 strides, sometimes.

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Stephanie Hayes: so yeah, the speed round is usually what most people see on the Internet, because those kind of go viral. And then the last trial, which is optional, if it is even held in a competition would be the cattle trial, where you work

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Stephanie Hayes: as a team with 3 or 4 riders, and each rider gets a cow that they have to pull out of the herd as a team. You move it down to the other end of the arena, and you put it in a pen, and you have 3 min to do that.

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Kris Hiney: Kind of like team penning then, but with a pole.

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Stephanie Hayes: No poles, no poles. Actually, that's not true. In Europe. They use poles in the Us. I have never seen anybody use a pole in the cattle trial.

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Stephanie Hayes: it's not like team penning, because

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Stephanie Hayes: I think the focus is a little more on.

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Stephanie Hayes: like the art of moving cattle.

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Stephanie Hayes: not just running the cattle down.

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Kris Hiney: It's more like sorting.

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Kris Hiney: Yeah, so many different.

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Stephanie Hayes: It's a little like, you know, class. So the sport is rooted in classical dressage.

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Stephanie Hayes: So the cow work is kind of more like classical cow work.

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Stephanie Hayes: you know. It's not. It's not cowboy style.

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Stephanie Hayes: It's more of and this is just how I've experienced it, my myself. Working the cattle and also in in the competitions.

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Stephanie Hayes: it's about being able to read that cow. It's about working with your teammates.

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Stephanie Hayes: and not and keeping things calm and quiet.

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Stephanie Hayes: So there's some stockmanship skills that are involved

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Stephanie Hayes: much like in the in the other 3 phases there is a dressage.

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Stephanie Hayes: There's a very dressage piece to this sport. You don't have to be a dressage rider to do it, though that's the great thing about working equitation is, it's open to everybody, and people from all sorts of different disciplines come to this sport, and it just.

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Stephanie Hayes: It's so enjoyable because you meet people that are Western riders English riders, dressage riders. Oh, I used to be a.

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Stephanie Hayes: you know. A ranch rider, and everybody comes from these different disciplines into working equitation.

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Kris Hiney: So I have lots of questions. Okay, so first, so I'm going to start with the easy ones. So in of the videos, I've seen these have all been Spanish horses, but in the Us. Is it still people that primarily have these? What you could like, these Iberian horses, or do other types of horses do this.

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Stephanie Hayes: It's open for all types of horses and all types of horses can do very well what you see on those Youtube videos is, you're probably watching, like the European championships.

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Stephanie Hayes: right? And everybody's riding Iberians or Iberian crosses.

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Stephanie Hayes: because that is the culture there. I mean, that's where this all started.

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Stephanie Hayes: The horses excel at it because the sport was kind of built around them.

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Stephanie Hayes: Here in the Us. And other countries. You don't have to ride a Lusitano to be successful.

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Stephanie Hayes: There's 7 levels in the sport. The 1st Level. The introductory is just done in walk and trot as you move up the levels you canter, and then you do

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Stephanie Hayes: lead changes through walk, and then you do lead changes through flying changes, and then you're required to ride, one handed in level 6 and 7,

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Stephanie Hayes: and it's a high degree of collection. So

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Stephanie Hayes: in the progression here, you can have, you know, just a very average moving horse. With some.

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Stephanie Hayes: you know, decent training can do quite well. Up in our lower levels, one through 3. It's just walk, trot and canter. Nothing collected is required, you know. Is your horse calm? Do you have a good working relationship with him?

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Stephanie Hayes: it. It's very basic.

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Stephanie Hayes: As you get up into the upper levels, levels 4 and 5, where you start working in collected work. I again, you're

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Stephanie Hayes: your average horse can do quite well, but more is going to be asked of them at that point.

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Stephanie Hayes: And not all horses are built for collection, which is where you know you're at in level 7 is a very high degree of collection, so

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Stephanie Hayes: every horse can do it. Is it going to be easy for every horse as you get to the upper levels. Probably not. But you're gonna

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Stephanie Hayes: have a really well-trained horse.

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Stephanie Hayes: and you're gonna have a lot of fun getting to that point. Our largest divisions right now are the adult amateur at Level 2, where you just start the cantering work.

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Stephanie Hayes: Because, you know again, like any breed can do this. I've seen draft horses, there's

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Stephanie Hayes: halflingers quarter horses, thoroughbreds, I mean every there's such diversity in in the breeds, which

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Stephanie Hayes: also makes it really fun and open for everybody.

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Kris Hiney: Right? So I'd say, like, that's I mean, true for everything. Once you get to the upper elite levels, you have to have the horse that's built for the job, but

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Kris Hiney: levels of a lot of events. It can be a more

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Kris Hiney: all purpose, horse, so to speak, or it doesn't have to be a specific.

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Kris Hiney: So working equitation.

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Kris Hiney: So we've got the cattle. We've got the, you know, kind of the Spanish influence.

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Kris Hiney: So, and you said they have to ride. One handed. What the heck kind of tack are we talking on these guys

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Kris Hiney: right.

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Stephanie Hayes: Well, another great thing about the sport is it's open to any kind of working tack and attire.

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Stephanie Hayes: So if you're a Western rider.

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Stephanie Hayes: you would have your Western saddle bridle and a working outfit. It bling does not

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Stephanie Hayes: go well in working equitation, because this is a working sport. So we want to see tack and an attire that would fit that like, you know. Think of your Sunday going out in your Sunday best riding clothes. If you're a dressage rider.

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Stephanie Hayes: you come from that background. You have your dressage saddle you can wear, you know, very conservative

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Stephanie Hayes: jacket boots, breeches, and have that dressage. Look If

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Stephanie Hayes: you are riding an Iberian horse and you want to ride in traditional tack and attire. Then you would have a Portuguese saddle and all of the

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Stephanie Hayes: accessories that go with that that's the attire that I ride in. I, my upper level horse is a Lusitano

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Stephanie Hayes: and I ride with the skirt, the coat, the

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Stephanie Hayes: working equitation saddle the crupper, you know the whole. Get out

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Stephanie Hayes: there's Spanish attire, which is different than Portuguese, and because,

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Stephanie Hayes: The sport is in. You know the European

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Stephanie Hayes: DNA. They're very particular to tradition.

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Stephanie Hayes: And you know again you watch the videos. And most of these riders are in their Spanish or Portuguese attire.

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Stephanie Hayes: So you get to pick what

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Stephanie Hayes: you're most comfortable in what your horse goes best in, and what would match your horse

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Stephanie Hayes: also, you know, if

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Stephanie Hayes: I mean, I think you could ride any horse in a Western saddle, but if you're riding a quarter horse, you may want to, you know. Show the show that tradition. So the sport is

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Stephanie Hayes: is showing what tradition different traditions of riding there are.

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Stephanie Hayes: It's not a costume class, you know, where you

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Stephanie Hayes: I was. Gonna ask like, do you have to declare yourself? I'm Portuguese.

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Stephanie Hayes: No, the only

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Stephanie Hayes: the only declaration is that you really don't want to mix attire and tack. We have a presentation mark in our collective marks.

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Stephanie Hayes: And if you are mixing attire and tack, you're not going to get as high of a score.

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Kris Hiney: Okay.

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Kris Hiney: so and I'm at a bit of an advantage because I have watched some of this. But could you maybe even talk about what type of maneuvers slash obstacles? Because I don't think people, unless I again inspire people to start googling this. They probably don't know what it looks like and all what's actually involved. So tell us a little bit about what things you might do as you kind of go up through the levels.

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Stephanie Hayes: Yeah, so at the very introductory level, in the ease of handling phase.

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Stephanie Hayes: you won't have more than 12 obstacles. I think it's like a minimum of 10 or 12 obstacles. You would have a gate to open a bridge to walk over. You'd have Slalom Poles to trot through. There could be a figure 8 to trot around

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Stephanie Hayes: you would walk through or into what's called a livestock pen, which is a 20 foot diameter.

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Stephanie Hayes: 10pen 533

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Stephanie Hayes: you would be trotting between the obstacles and walking. You could even walk some of the obstacles.

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Stephanie Hayes: At that level. No, no cantering is required, and you're really just

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Stephanie Hayes: flowing through the obstacle with rhythm. There's a lot of transitions that will happen. There's

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Stephanie Hayes: obstacles that you have to stop at and do something with your hand. Like. Ring a bell.

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Stephanie Hayes: You would stop between 2 poles for your switch cup and move a cup from one pole to the next pole.

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Stephanie Hayes: and then sort of the signature obstacle of the sport is picking up a grocepole, which is a big, long

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Stephanie Hayes: wooden dowel, basically between 8 and 11 feet long, and

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Stephanie Hayes: you would pick it up out of a barrel and then spear a ring that is on

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Stephanie Hayes: like a cutout bull, or even

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Stephanie Hayes: or even onto a jump standard. Usually it's a bull or some kind of

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Stephanie Hayes: animal thing. And you'd spear the ring and then replace the pole in the barrel.

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Stephanie Hayes: So that is called the bull line and

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Stephanie Hayes: So there's things that

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Stephanie Hayes: you have like different skills that you have to show. As you work up through the levels, you would do all of those obstacles. You would also do a side pass pole, maybe back through an L corridor. You can be asked to do the gate either forward or back through the gate.

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Stephanie Hayes: as you work up through the levels, you're going to be doing all those obstacles cantering now, and your circles are going to be smaller around the figure 8 or

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Stephanie Hayes: There's a obstacle called drums there. There are 3 barrels, and you have a pattern, not a barrel racing pattern, but a pattern of circles.

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Stephanie Hayes: Through those obstacles, and then you would do flying lead changes

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Stephanie Hayes: between those between those barrels or through your Slalom poles at the upper levels. Level 6 and 7, where you're required to ride one-handed

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Stephanie Hayes: your Slalom Poles, you would be changing leads approximately every 4 strides. So it's like your 4 tempes.

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Stephanie Hayes: the Double Slalom are just some very small U-turns to poles with a change of bend at the lower levels or at the upper levels, a change of lead through them.

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Stephanie Hayes: Your horse has to be supple, balanced, and on the aids.

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Stephanie Hayes: And you know, when I'm teaching clinics

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Stephanie Hayes: regardless of what discipline the riders come from, everybody walks away with. Wow! This is going to really help with whatever they do.

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Stephanie Hayes: because, you know, if your horse isn't on the Aids.

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Stephanie Hayes: For any discipline. You're gonna have trouble. And you know, I think you know, one of the great benefits of working equitation is that

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Stephanie Hayes: it just really brings horses and riders together as a working unit.

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Stephanie Hayes: There's no room for disobedience, and you know it's like we always take it back to working cattle like if your horse is disobedient. Opening the gate in the ease of handling.

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Stephanie Hayes: What if there's a 2,000 pound bull on the other side of that gate?

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Stephanie Hayes: You know you're gonna get killed

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Stephanie Hayes: like your life is depending on it, you know. So

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Stephanie Hayes: you know I have seen I've seen horses and riders

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Stephanie Hayes: just become so much better in their partnerships from practicing

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Stephanie Hayes: the sport, and then like taking it into competition.

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Stephanie Hayes: You know, it's a lot of fun.

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Kris Hiney: Yeah.

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Stephanie Hayes: You know, and not everybody has to take it, you know, to a show.

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Stephanie Hayes: but just learning how to execute the obstacles is going to help everybody, and that's why I love teaching as much as I do.

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Kris Hiney: Yeah. And I think I would encourage people to take a look at it, because I think people do get in a, you know, maybe bored or in a rut, you know, with some of the horse sports and want to try something new, and this does give a great outlet for horses to get also out of the rut, because they can get pretty tired of doing the same thing all the time. And this is a lot more mixing things up for them, and, like you said, really relies on that brokeness factor, so could be great for some reschooling of horses.

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Stephanie Hayes: And that's how I came into the sport. You know I was. I was at a place in my own riding like

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Stephanie Hayes: competitive dressage wasn't really where I wanted to go with it. But I love.

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Stephanie Hayes: I love training, and I love dressage. As you know, the

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Stephanie Hayes: the definition of dressage is training, and I loved that piece, but I didn't. I didn't want to do the competitive piece of it.

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Stephanie Hayes: And you know, with my Spanish barbs. It was a way to promote them in a sport

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Stephanie Hayes: where I thought that they would really excel, and they have but you know, tired of the 20 meter circles. And where am I going with this? Like what?

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Stephanie Hayes: And yeah, I mean my 1st clinic that I took my 1st introduction

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Stephanie Hayes: I was like, oh, my gosh! I can do this like I think I think I could be good at this

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Stephanie Hayes: when I I learn what it is, and how to do it, and it has changed

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Stephanie Hayes: the way that I start my horses. It's changed the way

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Stephanie Hayes: that I teach it has. I mean. My riding

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Stephanie Hayes: was kind of stagnant for a while, like a long time.

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Stephanie Hayes: and I'm such a better rider now, and I have so much more to offer my horses.

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Stephanie Hayes: and yeah, it has. It has been

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Stephanie Hayes: like a total game changer for me in my professional riding career.

how do you find

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Kris Hiney: trainers, horse events, etc, on working equitation.

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Stephanie Hayes: The best place to go is to the website of our national governing organization, which is U.S.A. working equitation. So usawe.org

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Stephanie Hayes: on the website. You're gonna find a description of

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Stephanie Hayes: all of the trials. So you can read about what they are.

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Stephanie Hayes: You'll find a list of professional instructors that are recognized through U.S.A. We

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Stephanie Hayes: that are in all corners of the country. There's

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Stephanie Hayes: There's 7 regions within the organization.

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Stephanie Hayes: and I think we now have a professional instructor or 2 in every region I serve on the Professional Development Committee.

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Stephanie Hayes: So you can also

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Stephanie Hayes: go. There's if you Google working equitation in your State.

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Stephanie Hayes: You may find that there is a affiliate organization nearby. You

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Stephanie Hayes: and these are little chapters more like local chapters of the national organization.

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Stephanie Hayes: and these groups are great to get people started in the sport. Most affiliate organizations are hosting clinics.

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Stephanie Hayes: Maybe they have an instructor that they work with. Maybe they're even offering shows.

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Stephanie Hayes: In each of the 7 regions we have a regional director, and that person would be your contact person. So if you're in

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Stephanie Hayes: Virginia. You're gonna be in Region 6, you can go on the website and look for the region. 6 director and email them and say, Hey, what's going on around me?

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Stephanie Hayes: so that will connect you to people in the sport who can help you get going?

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Stephanie Hayes: the working equitation community is like no other that I've seen in a lot of disciplines that I've been involved in. Everybody just wants to help grow the sport and be a resource, and it's the most welcoming

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Stephanie Hayes: and friendly group of people like

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Stephanie Hayes: ever. And it's so much fun. Clinics are so much fun. Shows are even more fun, because it's almost like the competition is secondary, you know, everybody gets to get together, and

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Stephanie Hayes: it's not

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Stephanie Hayes: I mean, yes, we are a competitive group.

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Stephanie Hayes: But in general, you know, this is a very challenging sport. We're just happy to be there and to be able to do it.

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Stephanie Hayes: It's not an easy sport. It's not

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Stephanie Hayes: for somebody that wants to just like memorize a dressage test, and then, like, Go ride one. You have to really know

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Stephanie Hayes: about all these obstacles and all the rules and all that.

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Stephanie Hayes: The rule book is on the website also, which has a description of all the obstacles and their execution.

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Stephanie Hayes: So I would say, the usawe.org website is the go to place for

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Stephanie Hayes: anything or contact me directly, and I can. You know I'm well connected throughout the country and

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Stephanie Hayes: know all of our regional directors quite well, and can get people connected. When I

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Stephanie Hayes: 1st learned about working equitation, and thought that this was something I wanted to help.

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Stephanie Hayes: promote and ride in get involved. I started an organization called New England working equitation.

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Stephanie Hayes: Now, I have a website which lists

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Stephanie Hayes: our shows and the clinics coming up and everything. You know that we're doing here in New England. I know that you have a

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Stephanie Hayes: a broad audience. On your podcast but I teach.

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Stephanie Hayes: I teach all over the East coast.

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Stephanie Hayes: almost every weekend. If I'm not showing I have.

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Stephanie Hayes: You know, people I can connect you with, regardless of what state you're in, so please feel free to reach out to me.

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Kris Hiney: Okay, all right. Well, we'll make sure that people take you up on that. So I think again, after everybody's listened to this, go look at the sport, because I think you'll be intrigued. We can't do it justice by just a verbal description. But I I definitely saw it. I was like, oh, that looks just like a ton of fun. So

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Kris Hiney: yeah, hopefully, we can bring you more people.

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Stephanie Hayes: Yeah. And just remember when you're watching these European championship rides.

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Stephanie Hayes: it doesn't start there, either. Either. People see that and are totally inspired. Like I was like.

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Stephanie Hayes: I gotta do this or you're intimidated. And you're like, Oh, I could never do that. You can do it because it starts

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Stephanie Hayes: walking and trotting.

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Kris Hiney: Right.

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Kris Hiney: but you could practice your pole sticking a ring without your horse right? Just start running around and sticking it.

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Stephanie Hayes: Definitely, certainly.

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Kris Hiney: So

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Kris Hiney: well, this has been fun, and I'm always excited to bring new sports to people, just so they can see how broad the horse industry is, and again find, maybe, that new passion that if you're getting a little bored with what you're doing.

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Kris Hiney: try something new, and and who knows? Maybe, as you work your way up the ranks, and you're gonna need one of those fancy Spanish horses.

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Stephanie Hayes: Get the feedback.

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Kris Hiney: Fancy prints and collecting from those guys. So I really appreciate your time today, Stephanie, and we'll put all the information for people in the show notes always. Remember, if you like, what you hear, you can rate us review, subscribe to the podcast you can hear more of us, but that has been another episode of our tack box talk horse stories with a purpose.