Back in 2009, the “Program Your Position” video series created by dressage riders Ruth Hogan-Poulsen and the late Jane Savoie was released on DVD. This fundamental training program was designed to reprogram a rider’s conscious mind through a combination of mental images and shorthand self-talk. By teaching riders to use visualization and specific, vivid buzzwords, Hogan-Poulsen and Savoie enable riders to correct their riding position without having to think about multiple body parts at once.

Previously, if riders wanted access to this program, they’d have to hope for a decent used copy on eBay. But Dressage Today has now released the “Program Your Position” videos here for Dressage Today+ members. (Learn more about becoming a Dressage Today+ member here.)

“Jane’s specialty was breaking down the mechanics of the basics,” says Hogan-Poulsen. “It’s easy to get lost [as a rider], especially people who have limited access to lessons, or who are trying to learn on their own, and Jane had a way of making this knowledge so accessible.”

Hogan-Poulsen’s own strengths as a more right-brained, artistic, creative thinker, she says, complemented Savoie’s, allowing them to reach a broader group of riders with different learning styles.

The two trainers were colleagues and collaborators for about three decades before Savoie died in 2021 after a five-year battle with multiple myeloma. Hogan-Poulsen says that while she focused on the biomechanics of horse and rider, the mental aspect of the program, including the training of the subconscious mind, was Savoie’s specialty. Together, the two crafted “Program Your Position” into a teaching tool that takes riders back to the basics in a clear, approachable, and concrete way.

“Jane was so good at creating these little checklists for riders,” Hogan-Poulsen says, “where they have to do one thing before they can work to achieve the next. And she was also excellent at using a horse’s response to a question as a way to gauge understanding. The horse’s response to that question was your answer, and then she’d give the clear next steps. The way she broke things down for both horse and rider—she really was just an excellent teacher.”

‘In it Together ‘til the End’

With regards to Savoie as teacher, Hogan-Poulsen certainly knows best. She began riding with Savoie as a teenager, taking an occasional lesson at Huntington Farm in South Stratford, Vermont, from the woman who would become her colleague and friend.

In her early twenties, Hogan-Poulsen decided it was time to go to Florida to “figure the horse thing out,” and she caught a ride south with Savoie, her husband, Rhett Savoie, and their horses. Jane was preparing for the Barcelona Olympic trials, and by 1990 Hogan-Poulsen was working for her full time as her assistant and groom.

Hogan-Poulsen traveled with the team to Europe in the spring of 1992, where Jane was nominated as an alternate for the bronze medal-winning Olympic dressage team with her most well-known mount, Zapatero (Nimmerdor x Watteau, by Floregon).

In the late 1990s, Hogan-Poulsen returned to Vermont with Jane and Rhett where their working relationship deepened; they rode together, taught together, and often rode each other’s horses and gave each other lessons.

“We were in it together ‘til the end,” Hogan-Poulsen says.

Jane’s legendary career included being long listed by the U.S. Equestrian Team on Genaldon and Jolicoeur, training with Herbert Rehbein in Germany, and competing in Canada, the Netherlands, Belgium, France and Germany. She won nine Horse of the Year Awards and three National Freestyle championships.

As a trainer and coach, Jane worked with the Canadian Eventing Team at the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta, and coached several U.S., Canadian, and Belgian riders in preparation for the 2000 Hong Kong Olympics, where one of her students, Susan Blinks on Flim Flam, won team bronze. She coached the Canadian Eventing Team again in 2004, was the lead instructor of the U.S. Dressage Federation Adult Clinic Series from 2007-2008, and served as instructor for numerous USDF University events and convention education sessions.

“I miss the way she could energize people to be excited about learning,” Hogan-Poulsen says. “She was so adaptable as a teacher. She was always trying to figure out how her students learned and what motivated them. She genuinely wanted to help people find their best ways to learn and retain information. That was really her forte.”

Options for Different Learning Styles

When “Program Your Position” was released in 2009, it came with five DVDs, three CDs, and a booklet; Jane was passionate that riders could use whatever learning style—visual, audio or kinesthetic—worked best for them.

“She knew that some people, for example, needed to listen to a description of a shoulder-in,” Hogan-Poulsen says, “while others needed to watch someone do it, and others needed to see a diagram. She really understood how people learned, and she was passionate about reaching as many riders in their own ways as she could.”

In addition to “Program Your Position”and several other training videos, Jane authored six books on equitation and eight additional titles, including a dressage-inspired fiction novel, “Second Chances,” published just five days before her death.

When she and Hogan-Poulsen created the concept for this video series, Jane’s husband Rhett, a professional videographer, was an obvious addition to their team.

“Jane was a master and wanted to do everything in one take,” Hogan-Poulsen says with a laugh. “So we’d have had many conversations and plans of what we wanted to do and how, but I really had to be on my game when we started filming. I learned quickly how to speak and present myself in front of the camera, because she’d say, ‘Are you ready? Because we’re only doing this one time!’

“It’s just so important to Rhett and me that this material, this work, doesn’t get lost,” she continues. “I’m so glad it’s going out into the world in a digital platform, so that riders will have easy access. It’s so valuable, so easy to understand, and geared towards self-motivated riders who seek additional support and education.”

Supporting the education of up-and-coming adult amateurs specifically was always near and dear to Jane’s heart, according to Hogan-Poulsen. This passion continues posthumously through the Jane Savoie Adult Amateur Fund, established in 2022 by The Dressage Foundation. The organization awards $5,000 individual grants to support the continued education of amateur riders.

Hogan-Poulsen plans to continue preserving her work with Jane, carrying out Jane’s legacy, and supporting the grant foundation. With Rhett’s support, she has been compiling Jane’s unpublished and self-published training tools into a digital platform for future release, further maintaining Jane’s legacy: her lifelong commitment to the art of classical dressage.