[Mike Matson]

And switching horses. Looks like Manolo was having fun on the western horse!

http://youtu.be/hCtAXXsUoKs

[Fillabeana]

Kinda fun...but I noticed that instead of trying out half-pass on the Andalusian, Josh Lyons did a simple leg-yield. The stock horse was consistently behind the vertical, though very responsive.
My guess is that Mr. Lyons does not know how to do lateral work beyond leg-yield (ie shoulder in, half pass).

[rizzodm]

Lyons seemed to have a harder time finding the buttons than Mendez.

[Mike Matson]

If you read the info provided by Manolo at the video, he says this is not Josh's horse, but a borrowed horse.

[Fillabeana]

I did read the intro.
Mr. Lyons did not appear to have problems ' finding the buttons' on the borrowed chestnut reining horse.
However, he did have a more awkward time riding the dressage horse (finding the buttons...and my point is that he appears to have no concept of half pass) than Mr. Manolo had riding the reining horse.

A reining horse is taught to spin, on purpose, on the wrong lead as compared to a pirouette. They can spin around faster that way, but there is no advantage to a turn like that while working cattle. In fact, Tom Dorrance is often quoted, when asked why his horses would 'spin wrong', that he had no use for such a maneuver while working cattle.

Also common in reining is a horse that doesn't change leads cleanly. Nowadays, a lead change in reining is often not considered faulty (or penalized by judges) if the horse changes in front, then on the next stride changes behind.

If the culture of reining horse training was well steeped in getting shoulder-in, haunches-in, half-pass, etc (as well as real collection rather than a 'headset' or a rollkured horse, but that's a whole new thread!) I don't think Mr. Lyons would have looked quite so awkward on the dressage horse.

[Core6430]

<snipped>
I noticed that instead of trying out half-pass on the Andalusian, Josh Lyons did a simple leg-yield.
....
My guess is that Mr. Lyons does not know how to do lateral work beyond leg-yield (ie shoulder in, half pass).

I agree. Lyons never progressed past a leg yield. When Lyons does leg yields while Mendez does half-pass... that sums up exactly how I feel when I'm talking to most western riders about half-pass. I'm talking about half-pass <visualizing Mendez's version>, and the western person is like "Yeah, I teach that <visualizing Lyons version> when the horse is 2". Which just leaves me wanting to slam my head into a wall.

I thought this video highlighted how crooked the chestnut horse was. It was especially apparent when the two horses were traveling down the center line away from the camera (about 48 seconds into it). The chestnuts haunches are perpetually traveling toward the leading leg. The stallion shows a horse that is keeping the haunches fairly well in-line with the shoulders.

However, I'm not taking this comparison of western vs dressage in this video very seriously due to the fact that I have no idea who trained the chestnut horse, and I'm doubting Lyon's had much time to actually ride either of the horses prior to the demonstration. It didn't seem like a fair comparison.

But it was really neat to watch!

[NOMIOMI1]

We didnt see the dressage horse do much other than a spanish walk and going around not into the outside rein for the most part.

I felt the chestnut was the more finished horse and ridden better by both riders.

None of the dressage was that impressive to me but Im just being devils advocate since so many wanted to point out the problems with the work horse.

Its seemed to do lot more work and show a bit more too

[OreoCookie]

I love watching those videos. There's a good one with Stephen Peters doing one tempis on a western horse.

Note the video was posted by Mendez, so was edited to show his best moments.