Should my trainer ride my horse?

Whether and how often a trainer rides a student's horse is one of the more nuanced questions in dressage instruction, involving considerations of horse development, rider development, and the specific training goals of the horse-and-rider pair. For horse development, occasional trainer rides serve several valuable purposes: the trainer can directly feel what the horse is doing beneath the rider's weight — the specific ways it braces, evades contact, or is uneven between reins — rather than inferring these qualities from observation; the trainer can work through specific training problems that are most effectively addressed by a more experienced rider than the horse's owner; and the trainer can establish or reinforce specific movements or responses that the student will then work to maintain. For rider development, trainer rides are educational when the student can observe them with specific attention to what the trainer is doing and why — watching an experienced rider work through a specific problem on your horse is one of the most efficient ways to understand what the exercise is for and what it looks like when done correctly. The appropriate frequency of trainer rides varies significantly with the situation: a horse with significant training problems that are beyond the student's current ability to address may benefit from regular trainer rides; a horse in training appropriate to the student's level may need only occasional trainer rides for assessment and specific problem-solving. Concerns about trainer rides include the risk of the horse becoming dependent on the more skilled rider's aids in a way that makes it more difficult for the less skilled rider to ride effectively, and the practical issue that a horse ridden primarily by a professional trainer is developing toward the professional's skill level rather than the student's current skill level. Discussing with the trainer their philosophy about riding students' horses — how often, for what purposes, and with what communication to the student about what happened — is worth doing at the beginning of the training relationship.