Bent and Kathrin Branderup

 

In total, I have now spent 8 months as an intern with Bent Branderup for two periods, in addition to several short trips   of 1-2 weeks to be a helper at the summer academy.  

 

For me, it is important that the dressage training is positive for the horse's body. The training we do should give a stronger and healthier horse.

 

A little about the impression from the first internship period

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I got a lot of new puzzle pieces that fit into the idea of training and treatment. It is always exciting to learn new things, but it is extra exciting when you get a small detail in place that ties many other factors together. Much of the work in standing and walking, with horses that had problems in their bodies, consisted of the same thing that I already do in a massage treatment situation. Instead of manually working on loosening the joints, there were now exercises where you do the same things. I still think treatment is important and has its place, partly because it can be less painful than working in motion. Being able to work with the same things in different ways is exciting, and it gave many new opportunities for combining treatment and training.

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When Bent teaches interns, he does so to a large extent by beginning by explaining the new exercise to be worked on. How it should be, why it should be like that, common mistakes, why the mistakes are mistakes and the consequences of the mistake. Some mistakes go well for a period of time on the road, others do too much damage. Then you have to try to get the task done yourself and you will be told if something is right or wrong. The advantage of that (and also the reason why he does it) is that when you have to figure out how to solve things yourself, you remember it much better than if you just train the horse by doing as you are told. His goal is not to train the horses through the students, but to train the students into trainers who can train the horses. Sometimes, of course, we also received regular teaching with little pokes at the seat and details. During the first two months at Bent's, we worked with field work and lunging during the lessons. Once we had taken the "Field work and lunging test" we switched to riding in the lessons and continued with field work and lunging on our own. I really liked the big focus on WHY. I always get a kick out of learning new things, and training where you are constantly shown why you should do things suits me very well. Why the horse should be bent on the volte, why it is important to have the heel down, why the heel should be given at a certain moment of the movement - always why! 

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