become incredible therapeutic riding horses! With the goal of developing independent riders, we need horses that will try to figure out what a rider may be asking for, even if they apply aids in a way that the horse isn’t totally accustomed to,” she says. She also stresses that horses used for therapeutic riding must be more than just service- ably sound because these horses work a lot harder in their jobs than one would expect. Even though much of a therapy horse’s job is performed at the walk, often the horses are carrying riders who may not yet be balanced, so as with any working horse, it takes care and effort to keep them sound. She explains why sound horses with good gaits are important. “Active, rhythmic gaits are essen- tial to maximize the benefits of therapeutic riding since lameness or gait abnormalities can greatly impact a rider who may be strug- gling with his or her own balance. Additionally, horses who crawl along without active gaits aren’t really helping riders to develop their core and seat.”
Up to the Task for Para While para-dressage horses need to have very similar traits to those in horses used for therapeutic riding, the list of attributes needed to be competitive in national and international competition is much longer. The criteria for selecting competitive horses also varies depending on the para grade and the rider’s style and preferences. Michel Assouline, who is a graduate of the French
National Equestrian School and coached the British Para- Dressage Team to gold medals in three Olympic Games (2008
Top: Kate Shoemaker, Peoria, Arizona, and her and her parents’s ten-year-old Hanoverian gelding Solitaer 40 (Sandro Hit x De Niro) competed in Grade IV and earned the freestyle bronze medal at the 2018 FEI World Equestrian Games (WEG) in North Carolina. She found Soli online, went to Germany to try him the same week, and with the support of her parents, purchased him in 2015. She is one of three U.S. riders (along with Rebecca Hart and Roxanne Trun- nell) to be the first-ever individuals from the U.S. to win medals in para-dressage at a WEG. Bottom: U.S. Grade I para-dressage rider Roxanne Trunnell, Rowlett, Texas, riding Kate Shoemaker’s six- year-old Hanoverian gelding Dolton (Danone I x Londonderry) in the FEI World Equestrian Games Tryon 2018. The pair went on to Grade I Freestyle bronze on the final day of competition riding to music from the movie Forrest Gump.
32 January/February 2019
Beijing, 2012 London and 2016 Rio) as well as in the 2010 and 2014 World Equestrian Games, reflects that horses in interna- tional para-dressage have gotten better and better and are of similar quality in gaits and scope to any other international dressage horses. “To put it in perspective, a good example is Sophie Wells and C Fatal Attraction, who at WEG 2018 were Grade V triple gold medalists and scored 80.75% in the freestyle. They were also United Kingdom Winter National Champions in Prix St. Georges and Intermedi- aire [in able bodied competition], in a country where the dres- sage standard is so high with the likes of Carl Hester and Charlotte Dujardin,” he says. He goes on to list tempera-
ment as the first quality he considers, then natural ability, when choosing para-dressage horses. It is important to remem- ber, he says, that while there is plenty of talent and skill among the international para-dressage riders out there, the very nature of the sport is that the riders have physical and/or cognitive disadvantages to able-bodied riders. This means the horse’s character and intelligence are very important.
Choosing a horse with natu-
ral balance and suppleness is also very important, he says; a horse that innately goes in a frame enhances the overall performance of the pair since
some riders may have issues with physical strength making it harder for them to package the horse into the proper frame. Finally, he touched on the quality of the paces of the horse saying the expression and the regularity of each gait is very important, but cautions that harmony of the pair can be compromised if the horse is too expressive for a particular rider to stay balanced and in control. Kate Shoemaker, 2018 WEG Grade IV Freestyle bronze
medalist from the U.S. and an equine sports medicine veteri- narian, explains that in her mind the three keys to finding the right horse for success in the international arena are gaits, temperament and rider match. She emphasizes that selecting the right horse for a rider is a very individual thing, because the horse’s strengths and weaknesses need to complement those of the rider. “For example, I am weaker and slower on the right
half of my body, which means I struggle more when riding horses that are stronger on the right,” Shoemaker explains. “I’ve learned that selecting the right horse that
Shelley Higgins/MacMillan Photography
Kim MacMillan/MacMillan Photography
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