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The USDF Adult Clinic with Jane Savoie Submitted by Meghan Nichols A Winning Clinic I was first introduced to Jane Savoie by a former trainer of mine about 15 years ago. After a bad ride at a show my trainer handed me the book That Winning Feeling and suggested I read it to help with my show nerves and confidence issues. I did, and I have been a big fan of Ms. Savoie’s ever since. Her spirit of positive thinking, her love of horses and her confidence just ooze out of the pages.
About three and a half years ago I had a pretty bad riding accident and this time it wasn’t just my confidence that was shaken; bones were broken, and I was terrified. As a way of coping I found myself going back to That Winning Feeling and then I bought another one of Ms. Savoie’s books It’s Not Just About the Ribbons. I found them both to be quite helpful, and they are books that I go back to over and over again. When the USDF announced that they were featuring Jane Savoie as the Adult Clinician I decided I had to apply. To my surprise I was accepted. In late March I traveled to Ashland, Nebraska with my mare Trousseaux and my dad, who flew up from Florida to see me ride.
The clinic was held at Pineland Farm and was a huge success. There were about 100 auditors and eight riders from around Region Four. The clinic started off with a lecture by Ms. Savoie. In this lecture she talked about attitude and the importance of positive thinking and asking yourself the right questions. She talked about what she calls “Stinking Thinkers”. Theses are people with less than positive attitudes who dump their mental garbage everywhere they go. She went around the audience and asked people to think of particularly gross things to put in her imaginary garbage bag. She asked the audience what they would do if someone came in to their house and dumped this bag out in the middle of their living room. People were naturally appalled and then she asked us why we would let someone do this to us with their mental garbage. Good question and it made me pause and think. Next she wrote the term “GIGO” on a dry erase board. The term stands for garbage in garbage out. The basic idea being that if we take in negative stuff negative stuff will come out of us. Ms. Savoie also ran the audience through an exercise where we learned to anchor a positive feeling. She had us get up and jump around and act excited. Once we got this feeling we anchored it by repeating a physical cue three times. This creates an association between the action and the emotion. She also instructed us on ways to ask better questions. She warned against starting a question with “Why?” or “How Come?” These types of questions can set up a victim mentality. For example if I ask myself “Why does my horse not take the left rein?” I will set myself up to answer something like “Because you are a bad rider.” Instead I should ask “What exercise can I do to put my horse in the left rein?” I will naturally come up with a more positive answer and therefore am more likely to have success.
After the lecture the riding started. The eight riders at the clinic had experience from training level to grand prix so the audience got to see a good mix of riding and horses. What I liked most about Ms. Savoie as I watched her teach was that she broke things down in such a way that everyone could understand her. One of the most difficult concepts a rider needs to grasp is the correct execution of the half-halt. She described the half-halt as a momentary closure of seat, leg and hand followed by giving. She said that for the most part the half-halt should last approximately three seconds. She had each rider squeeze with both lower legs into a closed outside hand while simultaneously using the inside hand to maintain straightness. So it went: squeeze with both legs, close the outside hand and twinkle, twinkle, twinkle (supple with inside hand) and then soften. She had us say out loud ADD…ADD…ADD while we were doing this to show us the length of time the half halt should last. One of the things that rang most true for me was when she stated that the difference between an amateur and a professional is that an amateur rides from letter to letter and a professional rides from half halt to half halt. WOW! Immediately I realized that this statement was going to change how I ride.
Meghan, Trousseau and Jane 
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Ms. Savoie also discussed suppling exercises as three quick indirect flexions. To do the indirect flexion, turn your wrist as if you were opening a door knob. It is a small action and she was careful to say she did not want the hand to cross the withers. When she talked of the size of the flexions it was broken down in terms of numbers. She would have students flex to +7 (7” from neutral) and back to +1. This +1 was the position the horse should remain in for correct flexion to the inside. From the saddle the rider sees the corner of the horse’s eye. These flexions were followed by giving and each horse benefited by lengthening their neck and stretching in to the contact. Her way of testing a horse’s suppleness is to see if the weight in the reins stays the same, if the horse goes down and long in the bending phase and lastly if the rider can put the neck anywhere and it does not affect the body. She also worked with riders to make sure the horse was in front of the leg at all times and she discussed in detail the training scale. She emphasized that if the rider doesn’t like what they have in their current gait that the speed of
going up to the next gait will only amplify the problem.
When it was my turn to ride I was excited (and a little nervous) to see what the lesson would bring. After watching me warm up a little bit she noticed that while Trousseaux had good rhythm and tempo, was in front of my leg and was accepting the half halts, she was stiff in the poll. This stiffness is something that I have been working on fixing for a long time but I had never had anyone specifically tell me it was in her poll (at least not that I remember). I had been doing bigger flexions to try to fix what I had been feeling but this type of suppling wasn’t addressing the area that needed fixing. She stopped me and made sure I understood the indirect flexion and took my whip so it didn’t get in the way. She had me practice giving the indirect flexion at the halt and when I was comfortable I moved to the walk. When I gave the flexion it was +1 to -1. I would put my leg on, flex to +1 while closing the outside hand and then got to -1. When I switched to -1 what was my inside hand would now close and become the new outside hand. I would follow this up by performing uberstreichen with my true inside hand to test what I had done. As I became more comfortable at the trot I was asked to do this in leg yield, shoulder-in and finally counter canter. Ms. Savoie cautioned the audience that this type of flexion was not like wagging the head back and forth which is bad as it affects the jaw only. The suppling movement I performed was small but it was very effective and I immediate felt the benefits in my mare. She became markedly softer in her body and her gaits grew.
The second day started with another lecture and Ms. Savoie discussed the Emotional Freedom Technique and showed us tapping points. EFT uses established energy meridian points (acupuncture points) on the body to relieve negative emotions. Ms. Savoie showed us where the tapping points are located and did an exercise with a few volunteers. The volunteers tapped on the points while voicing positive thoughts. Each volunteer started out with a high fear/anxiety level and at the end of the tapping their level of anxiety had dropped fairly considerably. It was an interesting technique that is very accessible to everyone and can be used for a variety of issues.
My second ride was as beneficial as the first one. I started out by warming up again for Ms. Savoie and she noticed that Trousseaux would sometimes come up in her head and neck when pressure was applied instead of stretching in to it. She had me halt and asked me to apply leg pressure while maintaining contact on the reins. She told me not to let my horse go forward or backward. The goal was to apply leg pressure and keep contact until Trousseaux stretched down. As soon as she did I was to give with the reins and let her stretch her neck and open her throat latch. Ms. Savoie helped guide Trousseaux down a few times but soon she was quite willing to do it on her own. Once we had it down at the halt I moved to the walk and began doing my flexions from the day before but I was careful to make sure her neck went down and lengthened. If it went up I would go back to the halt and ask her to stretch down again. The change in my mare was really quite amazing. Trousseaux got softer in her body, I felt her back literally unlock underneath me and her stride became longer and her shoulder was freer.
Overall she became a much more supple horse. It was an amazing feeling and it brought a huge smile to my face.
The clinic was a wonderful opportunity and I am really thankful that the USDF selected Ms. Savoie to teach these clinics. I gained many invaluable tools and it helped me to form a better partnership with my mare. Ms. Savoie’s positive way of approaching riding and life is something that I am going to think about anytime I encounter a “Stinking Thinker” or become one myself.
Reprinted with permission: This article was originally published in (KCDS) The Kansas City Dressage Society Newsletter, Extension.
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