How do you feel about cross training your dressage horse?

Do you feel that jumping your dressage horse periodically helps or hurts your training regimen? Is it important to do many different things with your horse? Or is it better to maintain consistency in training? As an eventer myself we obviously have to do a bit of everything to be able to compete; I like to compete at dressage shows as well as events and would like to get into jumpers as well. I think that showing in all these disciplines gives me a wider perspective on my riding. Do you think that jumping your dressage horse either at home or even in a show gives you the same perspective? Or is it a detriment to work that is difficult on its own?

I think it depends on the horse and rider combination. Personally, I love to jump and so does my horse, he happens to be very good at it and especially loves liverpools. It gives us a break from the 20x60 and asks us to stretch into a different type of focus. I've also had occasion to use the energy we develop after a few courses to flow back to a little dressage and have more bounce and collection. As a result, we jump once or twice a week, go for a hike once a week in which we get some good hill work accomplished, and school dressage two to three times a week. On the other hand, I have a couple of friends who jumped in their earlier days and have lost the enthusiasm for it. Their horses are perfectly happy to school dressage and go for a hack once a week. What kind of regimen does Debbie like to map out for her horses?

We jump at least once a week, dressage two to three times, one day a week off, and the other days are a mixture of lunge lessons (or straight lunging), conditioning, hacking, or anything that needs to be worked on for the other days. I believe that a good training schedule for a show horse involves variety and is flexible. If your horse is sick of the dressage court like mine gets, and believe me he lets you know, then the third day in row of flat work might have to become a hacking day instead. I do believe that variety can be brought into training without jumping, as you stated some don't like to jump, either the person or the horse, and that can be beneficial as well. It had just occurred to me that I had recently seen more of my dressage friends jumping, or having someone jump their horse than in the past and I wasn't sure if that was a trend that was going on in the dressage world, or just the small sample of people that I know.