Continuing Education

Photo by Sara Fogan

Charlotte Dujardin works with Hilda Gurney during the
2014 Dressage Symposium at the Los Angeles Equestrian Center.

 

                Have you ever wondered where a champion athlete goes after she wins an Olympic medal? If she is still competing, she goes right back to her coach to continue training. She may also brainstorm with teammates or participate in (or teach) a clinic to improve her technique or learn new skills in order to continue to excel in her sport.

                This weekend, I audited a dressage symposium at the Los Angeles Equestrian Center in Southern California. Charlotte Dujardin, the 2012 British Olympic gold medalist in dressage and reigning world champion in the sport, was the featured clinician. She and her former trainer, International Grand Prix champion Judy Harvey, were here to share their expertise with six accomplished equestrians and their equally impressive horses to work through specific training issues. They were there to observe, praise/critique, correct and motivate each rider to continue improving in her sport. Ms. Dujardin treated everyone with respect, humor and a little tough love—including Hilda Gurney, a former Olympic bronze medalist in dressage and popular trainer in Southern California, and her mount, Wintersnow.

                It wasn’t really a surprise that Ms. Gurney was there, but the incredible opportunity to watch these two champions cooperating to achieve a common goal did give me goose bumps. After all, in another context, they would have been competing against each other for the same title. But in this context they were teacher and student, and even champions will go back to school in order to remain in the game and stay at the top of their class.

                “It’s wonderful to watch two Olympians work together,” Ms. Harvey commented at the end of their session. She added that Ms. Dujardin benefited from her student’s experience as a competitor in dressage, while Ms. Gurney would have been inspired and motivated by her teacher’s enthusiasm and technical skills.

                “I still learn and watch [and visualize] other riders to get better at what I do,” Ms. Dujardin explained during a Q&A session during the clinic. She recounted a time when she had trouble doing a half-pass at the trot. Then, right before a major competition, she found a catalyst to overcome this block: while observing a former Olympic gold and silver medalist, Isabelle Werth, practice this movement, she finally “got” how to do it. Dujardin explained how mentally replicating every detail of Werth’s practice ride during an imaginary ride on her own horse, Valegro, enabled her to finally ride the half-pass in her own competition later that day.

 “Sometimes, watching someone else and visualizing what they do helps me to understand what I need to do to understand what I am doing wrong and correct technique if I feel stuck,” she said.

 

 

Sara R. Fogan, C.Ht. is a certified hypnotherapist based in Southern California. She graduated with honors from the Hypnosis Motivation Institute in 2005. For more information about Calminsense Hypnotherapy® and to set up an appointment, please visit http://www.calminsensehypnotherapy.com/.

© 2014