Feedback from the course in May 2010

Although I've ridden as a teenager, I've only had a couple of lessons; mostly I enjoyed a gentle hack around the Kentish countryside.  However, after an incident in my mid twenties with a runaway horse where although I stayed on, was black and blue from knee to knee, it took me 20 years to get back on a horse.  A very good friend carefully nurtured me back into the saddle; but my desire has always to firstly 'be in control' and secondly 'in tune' with the horse - building a wonderful relationship was important to me. 

Hazel Armitage introduced me last year to watch a 'Riding with your Mind'
course and I was hooked!  This was so my thing, so natural; to use our joint energies to communicate with each other! 

I was so pleased that I did my homework (Hazel is a great taskmaster!) of reading Mary Wanless' 'Riding Your Mind Essentials' which prepared me for the two days I was to spend under Elaine's tutelage.  I knew it was going to be great; it was actually fantastic... Elaine's patience, understanding and communication treating each participant as an individual made it an honour for me to be there - I knew that this was special!  I started with the basics, nothing was taken for granted, and my improvement and knowledge showed up immediately. 

My thanks to Elaine for her brilliant way with horses and people that allow them both to shine!  And so to practice... in readiness for next time!


Caroline.






 Thank you for the  Ride With Your Mind course and for introducing me to this way of riding, it was a revelation.
 Elaine was so clever and patient with Lanzoe and me,his response was uncanny as if he had been waiting a long time for this lesson!
 I think in the future we will have an even better relationship. As a relatively inexperienced rider I felt that I benefited enormously in terms of confidence and control.
The facilities,venue,catering and overall ambiance was fantastic, I would love to come to another course in the coming months.
Many thanks to you Hazel and to Elaine,with her incredible technique.

Denise.

RIDDEN SEMINARS

The Ride With Your Mind approach has been pioneered over the last 25 years by Mary Wanless, BSc. BHSI. By studying and using knowledge gained from physics, psychology, martial arts, dance, anatomy, among others, Mary Wanless has evolved an understanding of the physical and psychological relationships between the horse and rider. This has led to a unique and extraordinarily effective method of teaching and learning. In many ways it continues on a deeper level from other pioneering teachers such as Sally Swift.

The RWYM approach shows any rider how to organise her mind and body in the same way as the riders we might call ‘talented’. The skills of riding are communicated step-by-step in bite-size chunks. The techniques used in teaching are very streamlined. We increase the rider’s body awareness, and use images which help the rider to understand both what to do and how to do it. Through this approach incredible improvements can be obtained in a very short time, defying traditional expectations.

Elaine Butler has been working with Mary Wanless for 9 years and is a certified coach of the Ride with Your Mind method. We have been running courses with her every year since 2005, (sometimes twice a year) and have always found her inspirational. Elaine would be delighted to explore new ways to solve old problems in your partnership with your horse!



Format of Courses taught by Elaine Butler. (*Maximum of five people per day)
• Everyone receives a private 45 minute lesson in the morning with Elaine + 15 minute debrief with video footage of the salient parts in the lesson.
• Everyone is strongly encouraged to watch each other's lessons.
• Buffet lunch followed by a dismounted workshop / Q & A's for all riders together.
(Please bring pen and paper for making notes plus an exercise ball plus mat for floor exercises)
• In the afternoon 1 hour paired lessons to practise all the new pieces from the morning’s session

ABOUT THE INSTRUCTOR

Elaine Butler has been working with Mary Wanless since 2000 and is a certified coach of the Ride With Your Mind method. She works as a freelance trainer as part of the RWYM Network, working with riders and horses of any age or experience. Clinics are available on a regular basis through the year in UK and Europe. There are existing regular clinics in England, France, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Norway, Spain and Poland.


About Elaine Butler:

Elaine was born in Bournemouth in the South of England. After school she studied languages and left to make a career in sales and marketing in Germany and later in UK.  In 2000, after twenty years in this high-profile career she made a voluntary decision to leave her job and follow a childhood dream: to work with horses.

Although she had been pony-mad and ridden a few times as a child there had been no opportunity to follow it through, sadly. This journey was re-started in 1988 when she learned to ride again in Germany. Her first horse called Garfield, was purchased in 1990.


Garfield, then 6 years old, had been chosen for Elaine by her riding instructor. However he proved to be a highly-strung and sensitive animal, and had suffered some traumatic experiences in his previous home. Elaine was determined to help this horse lead a normal life, and in the course of this journey she made several explorations into holistic health therapies, saddle-fitting, natural horsemanship etc.

The first issue that arose however was that the horse was unhappy to be mounted and regularly reared up, throwing his rider. Being over-sensitive in the mouth, in his back and over-reacting to any contact with the rider’s leg, he also tended to accelerate and decelerate extremely quickly and unpredictably.  Elaine very quickly came to the realisation that her riding skills, which had been rather good on calm riding school horses, were severely inadequate when it came to a performance horse with these tendencies! Her childhood dream of owning a horse and living happily ever after soon became a nightmare where on some days she was too scared to ride her own horse.

In particular her balance was challenged, and no matter how hard she tried, she could not find out how to sit quietly in all paces so that she would not upset the horse. To her immense frustration Elaine’s riding instructor was totally unable to offer any good advice! He could control her horse in most respects but was unable to show her or explain to her how he did so. Everyone at the Riding Club told her the horse was unrideable, dangerous and far too difficult for her. She was advised to sell the horse and buy an older, easier one. However, she refused to give up on her horse of a lifetime. She knew that most of the serious problems could be solved by changing her balance.

It was through this situation that she went off independently in search of other teachers, so that she might learn how to control her body, balance and aids and gain a happier horse. None of the books appeared to explain in enough detail how to improve her riding, just what or what not to do. By chance she found a book that changed all of this; ‘Ride With Your Mind’ by Mary Wanless. She enrolled in her first RWYM course in 1996, was instantly convinced (as was her horse) and has been progressively more and more involved ever since.

The horse and rider went on to develop a wonderful partnership in every respect, competed at dressage and took part in many other events including Riding to Music displays. The horse is still fit and well, now 25 years old and still ridden regularly!

Elaine has also competed at show jumping and one-day eventing but due to injury concentrates on dressage with her younger horses, when teaching allows. She has three horses at her own yard that are also available for riding lessons. She teaches Ridden Clinics regularly in England and also at several locations throughout Europe, including France, Germany, Austria, Poland and Norway.







In her “spare time” she works with 2-3 other “rescued” horses each year who have been traumatised or have other difficulties. These are then re-homed with suitably experienced people when they are happy to be normal riding horses. Ex-racehorses are her speciality. For the past five years since starting this scheme, she has achieved a 100% success rate, working with 20 different horses and ponies with many physical, mental and emotional problems.  

Elaine loves seeing both horses and riders improve and watching all the misunderstandings “magically” disappear. She aims to make learning an interesting, inspiring and fun experience for everyone.  She works with riders from complete beginner to Grand Prix level. She also employs methods from other equestrian specialists, including Monty Roberts, Pat Parelli, Linda Tellington-Jones, Alexandra Kurland, Andrew McLean, Philippe Karl, Ben Hart, Margrit Coates, and others.



For more Information:
Elaine Butler
Appletree Cottage, Cat Street
East Hendred, Wantage
Oxfordshire
OX12 8JT


Telephone: (+44) 1235 833223
Mobile phone: (+44) 797 95 92 970








DEMYSTIFYING WHAT IT IS THAT TALENTED RIDERS REALLY DO. .

What is it that talented riders really do? This is what international coach Mary Wanless set out to find out in the late 1970¹s and early 80¹s. What she discovered was that the key pieces that make talented riders so able, tended to be things they were not consciously aware of, or couldn¹t explain.


It is now understood in sports coaching that the more naturally able the athlete/performer, the less likely they are to know HOW they do what they do so well. A huge amount of what makes them so good is unconscious. (They don't even have to think about it, leaving them “brainspace” for refining their skills)


But it’s just those fundamental bits that most ordinary riders lack. Think of it like this. If good riding is like baking a cake, talented riders already have the cake and can work on icing it, but most riders don’t need icing instructions (yet), they need the basic recipe for making
the cake… how much flour? Do they need eggs? etc.


The result of Mary’s research is RIDE WITH YOUR MIND, a constantly evolving way of coaching riders the key pieces that underpin riding, and coaching them in bite-sized chunks that riders can assimilate.


On RWYM clinics riders learn that HOW THEY ORGANISE THEIR BODY IS THE PRIMARY WAY IN WHICH THEY CAN INFLUENCE THE HORSE.




Mary teachinginternational Grand Prix dressage rider, HeatherBlitz


Nearly all instructors agree about the importance of having a good position, but many aren’t consciously aware of how critically this influences the horse, or of how to convey the complex ingredients that go together to make up that “position”.


A RWYM coach will help you to organise your body in a very precise, conscious way (hence Ride With Your MIND). Piece by piece, the coach will help you to use your primary
communication toolkit (that’s your body) to enable you to influence your horse’s carriage in an apparently talented way.


Each rider has their own body disorganisation to deal with, which unbalances the horse and sends him conflicting signals, making the rider part of the problem, rather than part of the
solution. But as the rider learns to maintain the correct mechanics, the effect on the horse is to have him lift his back and reach into the rein, in classically correct carriage. (As opposed to the horrible experience, of creating a hollow-backed horse with his head pulled in. Without correct mechanics riders and horses are doomed to this, and never get to experience the magic of being so in place that the horse chooses to carry himself with freedom and lightness).


Much of the traditional riding lore, presupposes that you as a rider already have your basic pieces in place, and that you are already able to organise your body in the right ways, so you can go on to organise and school the horse.


If you are taught by an instructor who is a talented rider, (and many of them are), they may struggle to convey to you HOW to do it, because in their body a lot of what makes it work just happens. If they got on and did what they were telling you to do it would work. But, and it is a huge but, most riders’ body organisation skills are nothing like their instructors. – Yet RWYM sets out to fill this gap.


Imagine that good riding is a wonderful place, a place people want to get to, like Paris in France. The directions they will require to get there will depend upon where they start from. It is no good giving someone from Jo’burg the same directions as someone from London or Tokyo. Conventional instruction tends to assume that because everybody is aiming for the same place, they need the same instructions. RWYM coaches help riders to map the territory that THEY need to cross to get to good riding wherever their start point is.


Of course some riders start much closer to the goal, and that’s wonderful, but RWYM doesn’t believe that starting from along way away should mean that you can¹t make the trip. RWYM coaches will also respect you enough not to lie to you about the distance you need to travel!


People who come on RWYM clinics do ridden work, dismounted workshops, and watch video feedback.


They say that the degree to which they need to be able to control their own bodies in order to ride is far more precise than they ever realised. They will also tell you just how weird it feels to organise themselves in the right way when that wasn’t their
usual body pattern. They rave about the way they have been coached and shown how to achieve a result, rather than just being told to do a particular
action. They also rave about the amazing difference they can make in a horse when they get themselves in place.


More advanced riders are equally amazed that with even better body organisation they can overcome persistent training problems, and develop the quality of their horse’s work. Riders come out of clinics with an awareness of what an organisational challenge it is to ride well, and the pieces that they need to begin the journey towards good riding - should they choose to accept that challenge.


They are often realising for the first time the gap between their “toolkit” and what
is required of them by a horse if he is to perform well.


However, they are usually very excited that they can close that gap, and that good riding is attainable if they practice and build on the pieces they have learned. Many feel that they are no longer doomed to the scrapheap of seemingly untalented riders, or to unhappily pulling a horse’s head in, in an attempt to get it on the bit.


Moreover, given time to get their body organisation established, they report that they are far more able to do what their trainer wants, and to have the effect on the horse that their teacher so wanted for them all along. 

SEMINAR, October 2010

Course dates: 23rd / 24th October plus 25th / 26th October 2010 (these last two days to be confirmed).
Venue Details: La Morère, 31580 Larroque, France.
Course Organiser : Hazel Armitage, Doucède, 31580 Larroque, France. Tel. 05 61 89 61 90 / 06 30 03 89.


Cost per rider: 120€ per day, minimum of 2 days (includes paddock/stable & hay for your horse, lunch & refreshments). Deposits due at the same time as reserving your place. = 50% of total cost. Balance due 15th September.
Cost for observers: 30€ for the whole day including lunch.


For availabilty and reservations, contact : Hazel