The Spanish Riding School

Have you heard of the Spanish Riding School? It may seem like a fairy tale where beautiful white horses seem to dance and leap in the air, kicking out their hind legs. The move is called the capriole and it requires an enormously powerful horse to perform correctly. A horse like the white Lipizzan stallions at the Spanish Riding School of Vienna.

Horse Talk – capriole: the word capriole means ‘leap of a goat’. The horse jumps from a raised position with the forehand straight up into the air, kicks out with the hind legs, and lands more or less on all four legs at the same time. It is considered the most difficult of all the airs above the ground.

The riding school was first named during the Habsburg monarchy in 1572 and is the oldest of its kind in the world. It wasn’t until 1729 that the white riding hall we see today was built.

1. In what century was the riding school first named?

2. How many years later was the white riding hall built?

The riding hall, or Winter Riding School as it is called, is a sunlight- flooded hall, mainly white with some beige and light grey, with a portrait of Emperor Charles VI above the royal box. It measures 55 by 18 metres and is 17 metres in height and can seat 480 visitors.

3. What is the perimeter of the arena in the Winter Riding School?

4. What is the area of the Winter Riding School arena?

For comparison an Olympic size dressage arena is 60 meters long and 20 meters wide.

The horses are looked after in the stables by the grooms, a group of eighteen women and men who care for the seventy-two horses housed in Vienna. The grooms each have their own grooming kit, and keep it carefully under lock and key when they are not there.

5. Assuming each groom is responsible for an equal number of horses, how many horses does each groom care for?

The school has 18 riders, comprised of 2 chief riders, 13 riders, and 3 assistant riders.

Traditionally, Lipizzaners at the school have been trained and ridden only by men. In October 2008, two women, Sojourner Morrell, 18-year-old from the United Kingdom and Hannah Zeitlhofer, 21-year-old from Austria, passed the entrance exam and were accepted to train as riders at the school – the first women to do so in more than 440 years!

 

 

The horses themselves are born on a farm outside Vienna. About 45 Lipizzaner foals are born at the stud in the West Styrian village of Piber every year.

The Piber Federal Stud is 555 hectares in size and approximately 250 horses are kept there, including 70 broodmares.

Math Talk – hectares: a metric system area unit widely used around the world for land measurement, agriculture and forestry. It is equal to 10,000 sq m. The abbreviation is “ha”.

6. What percentage of horses at the stud are broodmares?

7. What fraction of the broodmares give birth each year?

8. Estimate how many horses are born at the Lippizzaner stud in a decade.

The horses are born dark, becoming grey at 6-10 years old. They get lighter each year during the greying process.

The best stallions are selected and they start their education at the training centre in Heldenberg, which is about 30 miles from Vienna, from the age of four. The best of these then go on to become part of the Spanish Riding School in Vienna.

An advanced part of their training includes airs above the ground or school jumps, which are a series of higher-level classical dressage movements in which the horse leaves the ground.

Horse Talk – airs above the ground: They include the capriole, the courbette, the mezair, the croupade, the pesade, and the levade. None are typically seen in modern competitive dressage.

The pesade and levade are the first airs taught to the High School horse, and it is from these that all other airs are taught.

In the pesade, the horse raises its forehand off the ground and tucks the forelegs evenly, carrying all weight on the hindquarters, to form a 45 degree angle with the ground.

The levade asks the horse to hold this same position at approximately 30-35 degrees from the ground.

Unlike the pesade, which is more of a test of balance, the decreased angle makes the levade an extremely strenuous position to hold, and requires a greater effort from the horse.

9. Estimate the size of the angle marked by the yellow arrow. Better yet, use a protractor and measure it!

10. Is the stallion in the photo above performing the pesade or the levade?

The image of the Spanish white stallions is stunning. Their pure white coats are kept perfectly clean thanks to the hard work of their grooms. The stallions are never clipped, but are carefully rugged to help them to stay warm without the need to grow a very heavy winter coat. The stallions’ stables are kept clean to help prevent stains while they are laying down. If they do happen to lay down and become dirty they are washed on the site of the stain with a very mild baby shampoo.

During the summer break the stallions are sent to Heldenberg, where they received their original training. They are trained and continually exercised there, and spend a well-earned summer holiday there as well. Perhaps one day you’ll be in the audience at the Winter Riding School to see the dancing white stallions of Vienna!

 

 

 

 

1. In what century was the riding school first named?
Answer: The riding school was first named in the sixteenth century.

2. How many years later was the white riding hall built?
Answer: 1729 − 1572 = 157. The riding hall was built 157 years later.

3. What is the perimeter of the arena in the Winter Riding School?
Answer: 55m + 55m + 18m + 18m = 110m + 36m = 146m OR (55m × 2) + (18m × 2) = 110m + 36m = 146m. The perimeter of the arena is 146m.

4. What is the area of the Winter Riding School arena?
55 m x 18 m = 990 sq m.

5. Assuming each groom is responsible for an equal number of horses, how many horses does each groom care for?
Answer: 72 (total number of horses) ÷ 18 (number of grooms) = 4 horses. Each groom is responsible for 4 horses.

6. What percentage of horses at the stud are broodmares?
Answer: 70 (broodmares)/250 (total horses) × 100% = 0.28 × 100% = = 28%. Twenty-eight percent of the horses at the stud are broodmares.

7. What fraction of the broodmares give birth each year?
Answer: 45 (annual number of births)/70 (total number of broodmares) = 45/70 = 9/14. Nine fourteenths of the broodmares give birth each year.

8. Estimate how many horses are born at the Lippizzaner stud in a decade.
Answer: 45 (number of foals born in a year) × 10 (number of years in a decade) = 450 foals. Approximately four hundred fifty foals are born each decade.

9. Estimate the size of the angle marked by the yellow arrow. Better yet, use a protractor and measure it!
Answer: The angle is approximately 30°.

10. Is the stallion in the photo above performing the pesade or the levade?
Answer: The stallion is performing the Levade. The angle of his body to the ground is approximately 30°.

Common Core:
4.OA.A.2 – Addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division word problems
4.MD.A.3 – Apply the area and perimeter formulas for rectangles in real world and mathematical problems.
4.MD.C – Geometric measurement: understand concepts of angle and measure angles.
5.NF.B.3 – Understanding fractions: word problems
5.NF.B.4b – Area and perimeter: word problems
6.RP.A.3c – Find a percent of a quantity as a rate per 100

Photos:
Capriole; YouTube screen shot
Winter Riding School; Public Domain
Spanish Riding School – Vienna by John Harwood; CC BY 2.0
Austria-01113 – Mares and Foals by Dennis Jarvis; CC BY-SA 2.0
Levade; YouTube screen shot