Horse Magazine August 2014

AUGUST $7.50

WEG Update

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AUGUST 2014

Transitions

Safety in Eventing

Tekna Leaderboard

Last test for the Aussie Showjumpers

Andrew McLean - Thinking about Horses

The Holstein Future with Dr Thomas Nissen

Maybe Baby?

What causes lameness in Showjumpers?

Rider of the Month:Amy Graham

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Eventing Leaderboard

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CONTENTS

76 Relaxing the Racehorse

Mastering the Principles with Miguel Tavora and Grace Kay 56

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Jessica Manson & Christine Bates, A Case Study

What's new for Spring?

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www.horsemagazine.com 5

Editor: Chris Hector CEO: Roz NeaveAssistant Editor: Ute RaabeDesign: Alexandra Meyer Accounts: Peter BosnakisPhone: (+61) 3 9421 3320 Fax: (+61) 3 9421 3375E-mail: [email protected] Address: PO Box 2316 Richmond South 3121

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On the Cover: Julia Hargreaves and Vedor Photo: Roz Neave

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Page 38WEG COUNTDOWN

Aussie Dressage at Fritzens, James

Paterson-Robinson,

and Paul Tapner

30 DAYS TO GO

Visit PAGE 89 for more information!


WHICH WAY FOR EVENTING?Consider these two photos – the one on the left is the winner of a tough two star contest at the Melbourne International Horse Trials at Werribee. How nice is the picture? The rider is smiling, the horse looks comfortable (I was at the finish, the chestnut came off the course looking great), this is – hopefully – the face of modern eventing. The photo on the right is from the Olympic Games of 1960, and yes, that is a dead horse lying in the ditch.

I remember one day, not long after Wayne Roycroft, as the head of the FEI eventing committee, had made the courageous decision to alter the rules of the sport that

saved Eventing as an Olympic event (and don’t forget, before Wayne acted, the International Olympic Committee had already decided that there would be NO three day event at the Beijing Games). Wayne was visiting THM and he flicked open the 60/61 copy of l’Annee Hippique on my desk and pointed to the photo – ‘that’s the eventing the people who are screaming about the changes to the rules want to save!’

Let’s not beat about the bush. Badminton was not a triumphal return to the ‘good old days’, it was a disaster and a disgrace, and the course builder should have been sacked on the spot for bringing the sport into disrepute, and the organizers should have been pleading with Michael Etherington Smith – who can build demanding AND horse friendly courses – to repair the damage before next year’s Badminton becomes the focal point of a well-organized campaign to ban eventing.

As Pippa Cuckson has pointed out in her blog for Horse-Canada:

“Badminton attracts 80,000 spectators on cross-country day but few got their money’s worth. Those in the second half of the course waited up to 20 minutes to see a horse, and when one finally lumbered into view it was invariably struggling. There are telling pictures of Quimbo over-jumping at the

beefed-up Vicarage Vee; I’d wager he gave himself a real fright at the fence before it, something you rarely see from the confidence-giving hands of Andrew Nicholson.”

“We are in a strange era now of extreme public sensitivities. The negative perceptions of spectators on the ground that might once have preoccupied organisers are now subsumed by the power of social media. The general public does not understand – indeed, why should it? – the nuances of the different horse sports. How can equestrians point the finger at the dire completion rates in Middle East endurance when a retirement/elimination rate over 50% was depicted as a badge of honour for Badminton?”

Pippa also points out that it rendered Badminton useless as a selection event, with three of the British team for the WEG not even going around the track. Using this year’s Badminton results for Caen is like trying to pick a four by one hundred relay team on the basis of iron man results. When even the winner – Sam Griffiths – talks about horses coming off the course ‘shattered’ and worrying about the effect on them mentally, you know that something went very very wrong in the nature of the challenge put before the horses at this year’s Badminton.

It only provides ammunition for the extreme animal liberationists when idiots babble about the need for eventers to push through the pain barrier – if a sport routinely subjects horses (who don’t get to decide if they want to

FRANGIBLE PINS

STEEPLECHASE

HORSEMANSHIP

Gabrielle Pither and Max Almighty


“It must be ingrained inextricably in all of our brains that neither the difficulty of the cross country course, nor the ground, nor the

weather, nor the perceived unfairness of a particular fence are responsible for the catalogue of deaths that our sport has suffered and suffered only in the last 14 years. So - what IS responsible?”

“Horses do not want to fall and usually in some way pilot error is the cause. Until the 90s the sport was essentially influenced by cross country."

"Against a long-forgotten sombre warning from the architect of Badminton, Frank Weldon, the sport has been increasingly opened up to lower end riders - some of whom graduated to compete at a higher level than matched their aptitude. This resulted in softer cross country courses developing to cater for the lowest common denominator. The cross country slowly became less demanding as the difficulty of the other two phases was periodically strengthened. Results therefore were increasingly influenced by the dressage and jumping phases.”

“Add into this new mix the steeplechase exiting in 2005: Hitherto the steeplechase had served as the bridge that enabled the horse and rider to cross from the dictation of dressage and show jumping - to the initiative and quick thinking required for cross country. It also afforded the rider a chance to ride forward to a fence in balance without interfering with the stride pattern - a skill sorely missing from the repertoire of several top riders at Badminton this May. Looking for a stride unfortunately often takes precedence over ensuring the horse has seen the fence and is drawing towards it in balance.”

“In addition it worries me the pressure that beeping stopwatches and minute markers put on riders, pushing them into a high risk area. When the beep goes off too soon, indicating time faults notching up - it can encourage a split second wrong decision in front of a fence.”

“I feel our biggest priority is to ensure riders take responsibility for every fence - a responsibility which has been eroded over years of spoon feeding and setting riders up with helpful turns and prep fences and more recently brush on top of way too many fences, accommodating sloppy riding and jumping.”

“Riders must, as a vital part of their training, also allow their horses to practice thinking for themselves - a requirement that marches in the opposite direction to the other two phases.”

“In conclusion, accidents in life will always happen. Our drug - the horse - can be, albeit mostly unwittingly, a dangerous animal, whether we are on him or off him.”

THE GREAT DEBATE

LUCINDA GREEN

Six-time- Badminton-

Winner

compete) to pain, it has no right to exist. Sure, horses will get hurt, they hurt themselves out grazing in the paddock, and sadly, occasionally, humans also get hurt, or worse, but these incidents must always be the result of accidents not a normal, inevitable consequence of the demands of the event.

It is perfectly possible to have good sport, great sport even, like we had at Werribee, without subjecting horses to outrageous stress, or putting the lives of riders recklessly at risk. It’s time to decide, and if there are some who, from the safety of their comfortable armchairs, bemoan the softness of modern eventing, they are free to enjoy the delights of cage fighting, at least there the contestants are more or less willing participants, and for those of us, who love and respect horses, we’ll continue to celebrate a form of modern eventing that pays skill and horsemanship not blind courage and risk taking.

And no, eventing will not be what it used to be and that is a very good thing indeed. - CH

The former doctor of the Luhmühlen event, Bernd Kabelka was quoted as follows: “Fences should be made easier. Also the distance is extremely long. After five or six kilometres the horse begins to tire, the rider may lose concentration. Falls are pre-programmed.Professor Kabelka is an expert on accident and trauma surgery as well as an orthopedic surgeon. He is the go-to surgeon for many sport stars, including Jan Ullrich, Steffi Graf or Pete Sampras. He also criticizes the solid construction of cross-country fences, “It’s like the horse runs against a wall. If it gets caught on the fence, it can flip over and in the worst-case scenario 500kg of horse land on the rider.”

BERNARD KABELKA

Medical Official

Eventing Star, Paul Tapner and Kilronan jumping the infamous Vicarage Vee at

the 2014 Badminton Horse Trials

Phot

o: K

it H

ough

ton

We understand that Christoph Hess distributed copies of Chris’ editorial amongst the members of a task force group that met in Warendorf on 9 July to discuss safety measures in eventing.


SHOWJUMPING

DatelineSPANGENBERG

I didn’t know quite what we would find in Spangenberg, certainly not the exquisite beauty of the town

itself, nestled at the foot of the castle (the berg in Spangenberg), or the cute little showground, squeezed on the side of a hill, so tiny that it took hours for the semis to unload their horses, and head back down the hill to their appointed place. It is a charming unpretentious country show, with the friendliest – and most helpful – press officer, Constanze Goetjes, that we’ve met up with for a long time.

It was wet, very wet on the day we arrived at the grounds, with the show to start the next day, but these guys are super experts when it comes to putting down a surface, and while it might have looked a little forlorn on the Wednesday, come Thursday the footing was fine and it was hot and sunny.

The Aussies are pretty tight at the top after the first selection round at Mons Ghlin in Belgium, with three qualified to go through into the battle for the two automatic places that come out of the trials: Amy Graham and Bella Baloubet leads with 8 points (4 qualifying round + 4 GP 1st round), followed by Jamie Kermond and Quite Cassini – 9 (1 qualifying round + 8 GP 1st round) and James Paterson-Robinson and Boris – 12 (0 qualifying round + 12 GP 1st round).

The rest –Thaisa Erwin and Matilda, Julia Hargreaves and Vedor, David

Chris Hector and Ros Neave are there in Germany to capture all the tension and excitement at the very last selection event for the Australian Showjumping Team for the WEG in Normandy…


SHOWJUMPING

Goodwin and Warrego Jericho, James Passey and Yirrkala Cortina, Alison Rowland and Bickley Brook Bella are – together with whichever of the top threesome misses the automatic place – in a battle to win the selectors’ (Rod Brown, Clive Reed and Graham Watt) approval for the two discretionary spots, which along with the automatic selection of Edwina Tops-Alexander makes up the team of five for the WEG. The objective selection process is in truth, only two fifths an ‘objective’ selection process, if all that makes sense…

None of the horses in team contention started on the Thursday, but some of our riders grabbed the opportunity to have a hit out on their other horses, with JPR (with three James or Jamies in the camp, it is JPR, Kermo and Jim, to avoid confusion) picking up a second place in the 1.40m class on Moonstar.

Friday dawns sweetly sunny, but with the announcement that Bickley Brook Bella has been withdrawn from the selection process, which may cause a little

heart burn for Jamie Winning, who despite quite good form on Wirragulla Nicklaus in the lead up, was omitted from the squad of eight, indeed

omitted from the two reserves, even though her results, particularly in the 1.50m and above classes would seem to have put her into the eight.

However, even though ‘Jim’ is not in the official selection squad she can still claim a place if she goes well enough...

This ‘objective’ process becomes more complicated by the second of the selectors little sub-rules – to claim one of the automatic spots, the combination must emerge from the four selection rounds with a total of less than 20 points, which means JPR and Boris are just eight points away from missing the cut.

James Passey has had good form in the 1.45m classes in the run up on Yirrkala Cortina, but has seemingly found anything higher than that, difficult. So it is today, over the 1.50m track they struggle. A rail, then a big stop for 12 penalties including four time.

David Goodwin and Warrego Jericho also struggle, 12 jumping faults and one time.Vedor has apparently been

Amy Graham and Bella Baloubet


DRESSAGE

It’s relaxing and stimulating at the same time, and, as always, good training is

easy to follow, the steps move logically from one step to the other.

And in the case of Miguel Tavora’s gentle brand of dressage, at its heart is the German Training Scale:

“I know very well what I want to achieve, I do not have a rigid plan to the lesson, and I have a plan to develop the physical ability right from the warm up of the horse. If I am going to work on the flying change, and if the flying changes were a bit crooked the day before, then I am going to work on making the flying changes more straight and that begins right at the beginning of the lesson, I am working on that straightness. But I am not rigid with the principle, if

the horse is not responding in that way, then I must immediately have another way to make him respond, the technique is only important if he gets sticky.”

“I want the horse to turn to the right with the right rein and with the right leg on the girth, but the horse is not turning to the right, that is not important, I turn to the left and after turn to the right. I want him to do the exercise in the correct way, not getting sticky because I am trying to get him to respond to my plan and it is not working, no point in that, I have to immediately change. This exercise that I planned to make the horse go straight is not working, erase, this is not backing off, this is being clever. If this way didn’t work, I am going to find another way, because what is important is

to make the horse do the right thing.”As always, I marvel at the ability of

real teachers to find endless ways of saying the same thing, differently. On one of Miguel’s treasured little circles,

As I sit in the indoor school, I wonder in how many hundreds (thousands?) of similar schools around the world, the same scenario is being played out. The dance of horse and rider that is gymnastic training, the dialectic of teacher and student, that keeps this art alive…

Story by Christopher Hector & Photos by Roz Neave

mastering the principlesrefining the technique - learning with Miguel Tavora and Grace Kay


DRESSAGE

Grace is asked to speed up Karingal Jamiroquai’s trot: “speed up, very active hindlegs, then when you collect, that speed becomes elevation.”

And like any real teacher, encouragement is always offered: “That was very good, one pat to him, two pats to you, you are very clever.”

We see the effect in the next exercise, down the long side, “shoulder in, a bit more forward trot, then travers, then collect and elevate,” and into another signature figure of Miguel’s, renvers – travers – renvers, “over collect, and into passage, just a couple of steps.”

Grace knows what to do next, out on a twenty-metre circle and refresh the trot…

“Collect again.”And Grace immediately reaches for

a little circle, she knows that collection is nothing to do with pulling back, the big chestnut collects and offers a couple of steps of piaffe: “Two steps, pat, I don’t care it is not very good, pat and do it again.”

Later, Miguel explains his lesson plan with Jamiroquai, and he points out that the little bit of piaffe and passage was more for my benefit, and that he has been moving away from those movements as the horse moves into Small Tour competition.

“My aim is to develop the expression, continue to develop the trot. I taught this horse a bit of piaffe and passage, but now he is working on the Prix St Georges, and I don’t want to mix that in too much. I was working on the pirouettes and the canter, and developing mostly impulsion, mostly following the German scale of training

to develop the Schwung, the rhythm, the cadence, but on a level to achieve more the collection.”

Certainly the collected work has a dramatic effect on the quality of the medium trot…

The collected work in canter uses much the same technique, the flow

from renvers to travers and back again. Miguel makes a very subtle distinction between the principles, which do not change, and technique which evolves and changes with the breeding and type of horse…

Of the great masters of history, Miguel returns over and over again to Gustav Steinbrecht, who died in 1885, but not before he published his great work, Gymnasium of the Horse, based on the principles of de la Guerinière.

“Steinbrecht is absolutely up-to-date. When I say Steinbrecht, it is the philosophy, the message, not exactly the technique, because the techniques change with the horse, and every time the horse changes, we need new techniques to adapt to the new horse, but the principles are always the same: I want my horse to go straight and to go forward and be able to turn to the left and to the right when I want him to, and I want to be able to stop when I want him to stop, and that is the basis of everything. The principles are the same, the techniques are a bit different.”

“Even reading about a technique that is no longer necessary, or so useful, with today’s horses, is not a waste of time, because it can help you understand what the correct technique can achieve on the principle you are looking for. If you are working on something and you feel this technique is not working, then you can say, let’s see, with my experience, I can try another technique to achieve the same aim.”

For the canter pirouettes, Miguel is applying the same technique of moving from one lateral bend to the

“Steinbrecht is absolutely up-to-date. When I say Steinbrecht, it is the philosophy, the message, not exactly the technique, because the techniques change with the horse, and every time the horse changes, we need new techniques to adapt to the new horse, but the principles are always the same."


I remark to him, that you know when you are entering a real horseman’s stables, everything

looks workman-like and well maintained, real horseman are quiet and assured and there is no clatter and noise… seemingly it is the same with elephants!

“So many officials, who go to the elephant centres, say that after we have been working with them, there’s less noise from the elephants, less destruction, less anger. It’s the same with all animals; it is all about communication. If you communicate very well, then the animal’s security level is more assured. Insecurity starts to set in when there are unpredictable elements, especially unpredictable violence, in a relationship. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a human-horse, human-dog relationship or between humans' or between horses, it’s all the same.”Is that ability to quietly establish a relationship with a horse something people can learn as a technique? Or is that something that some people have, like the Australian, John Pinnell, who used to break horses in five days. It seems to me that those guys have something about their body language that the horse just instantly relates to or am I making that up?

“No, I think there is sense in that. All of the great horsemen I have ever seen in my life have generally been the same kind of person. They tend

to be passive in the way they move amongst horses. They don’t move quickly and jerkily, they move quietly and smoothly. So, I think it has a lot to

do with, I guess you might call it their energy. Then I think the other side of it, is also the clarity of what they do, they use pressure-release in the way they apply aids, and are consistent in that. It’s really a mixture of those things. I think that’s what you see with not only good horse trainers, but also good dog trainers.”

“I have done a fair bit of work in zoos; good zoo trainers are the same. They tend to be clear with their cues but also their body doesn’t give out contrary messages to what they are trying to achieve. “Is that part of your big problem that you can get a horse here and you can

work on it, get it confident, get it responsive but then when you send it back to the owner they work in a pressured job and they haven’t got much time with the horse, they are getting hysterical and they don’t have much animal feel anyway. And then the horse starts to unravel again. Is that life with you?“That’s life for everybody who trains for other people. I think that’s a major problem. But by the same token, knowledge is power and often it is

HORSEMANSHIP

All of the great horsemen I have ever seen in my life have generally been the same kind of person. They tend to be passive in the way they move amongst horses. They don’t move quickly and jerkily, they move quietly and smoothly.

THINKING ABOUT HORSESA conversation with Christopher Hector

Andrew McLean It is always a pleasure to sit and talk with Andrew McLean, he is a thoughtful horse person in a world where so much ‘horse knowledge’ is hysterical hype.


HORSEMANSHIP

people who don’t know what they are doing. What I’ve learnt in the years that I have been doing this, some people don’t really want to know and even think they don’t need to know. They work by feel and perhaps intuition and they may be very good. But for a lot of people knowledge is power, and so they learn various techniques that work and they recognize how understanding learning processes optimally influences the horse’s behavior. They start doing what they do very much more clearly and avoid being ambiguous and confusing. That really goes a long way.”

“But I do think that basic body tension in handling horses also spells success or lack of success, maybe even disaster sometimes. You see that especially in dressage, some people I teach tend to have too high energy levels; they are too tense and too worried about this and that. They tend to not have feel, because they are too tense to respond to the lower levels of feel, the lighter aspects of feel.”

“That’s why so many people spend so much time with various techniques to get riders to be more relaxed in the saddle and to learn to feel what the horse does. It helps when they learn what the animal does in hand and under saddle.”The thing that strikes me the most when I go to an Australian dressage competition, is that the breeding of the horses and the type of the horses is extraordinarily different to ten, fifteen years ago. But the riding is perhaps not as good as it was then – riders like Erica Taylor, Ricky MacMillan. Maybe instead of you having an equine behaviour centre, do you think you need a human

behavioural centre here, where you can get out and drill the humans a few hours a day until they get their responses good and reverse the equation?“Possibly, but again I think that so much of it, is knowledge. What Ricky MacMillan, Erica Taylor and people like that do, and have done for many years, is that they have used learning theory so well and achieved self carriage. I know Ricky MacMillan for one, is absolutely insistent on self-carriage and not many riders really understand it.”

“To my mind self-carriage is all about good training. If you claim to have trained a bird to sit on your arm, you need to prove it by letting go of its wings. Otherwise you are just holding it while it’s sitting on your arm. That is not training.”

“I think that we need to recognize the importance of self-carriage: when you release the reins just for two strides, the horse should stay in your speed, on your line and should stay in its own outline. The speed, the line and the outline, it is really critical to train that, because when the animal is trained to stay in self-carriage, it not only looks beautiful, it also confers a certain relaxation for the animal

because he is doing it himself, he has learned to do it. When animals do things on their own, through training, then they are always much happier and certainly healthier. I think it really impacts on their welfare if they are constantly held in a very tight rein by the rider and they are not in self-carriage.”

“When horses are not in self-carriage, the effects of chronic stress may range from gut disorders, immunological disorders and even reproductive disorders. These effects of chronic stress from cortisol are nature’s death warrant to an animal that doesn’t fit.”

“Consistency is critical too. Let’s look at a key issue for any rider – transitions. Okay we are supposed to make the transition in a certain time frame – but how quickly? One, two, three, four, five strides? If we don’t really know what we are trying to achieve, then how can we transform randomness into a solid habits? And here is where learning theory comes in…”

“If you can teach the riders the basic principles that arise from learning theory, and they are not difficult to learn, then they can improve the way they work with the

“To my mind self-carriage is all about good training. If you claim to have trained a bird to sit on your arm, you need to prove it by letting go of its wings. Otherwise you are just holding it while it’s sitting on your arm. That is not training.”


Five Australian combinations travelled to the CDI4* at Schindlhof in a bid to secure one of four team positions for the WEG. To avoid confusion, Schindlhof is the name of the beautiful stable owned by Evelyn and Klaus Haim-Swarovski, yes the Swarovski family of crystal fame and fortune. Fritzens is the name of the small village at the base of the Austrian Alps. As to be expected, the venue is first class, complete with a stunning mountain panorama. And with the WEG around the corner, Team Australia was joined by Team USA and riders from Mexico, Belgium, Spain, Denmark, France, Switzerland, Austria, Ireland, Russia and Poland. Here is how the Aussies fared.

Photos by Kenneth Braddick and Carol Newby

1. MARY HANNA AND SANCETTEMary and Sancette cracked the 70% to finish in sixth place; two 5* judges, Stephen Clarke and Thomas Lang had her in third place. Unfortunately the lowest score came from Australian judge Susie Hoevenaars.

2. KRISTY OATLEY AND RONAN 2A personal best score for Kristy and her 14-year-old stallion was awarded with eighth place in the Grand Prix.

3. BRIANA BURGESS AND LA SCALAGetting better and more experienced

with each event – 13th place in the Grand Prix and 12th place in the Special for the youngest WEG contender.

4. LYNDAL OATLEY AND SANDRO BOY“Something was not right” Lyndal said of her ride with the stallion. As a result the pair played

it conservatively and finished in 14th place in the Grand Prix. They did not contest the Special.

5. MAREE TOMKINSON AND DIAMANTINAIn their first event after leaving Australia Maree and Diamantina struck mixed fortune. The mare came off the truck with a

Postcards from

Austria

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WEG COUNTDOWN


WEG 2014 COUNTDOWN

30 DAYS TO GO

swollen forearm. Maree said, “She really was a very good girl, but very flat, and just not like herself. She is such a trooper and didn’t let us down at all, so much travelling and carrying an injury I was very proud of her and grateful for the huge effort she put in.”18th place on 67.400%.

6. KRISTY OATLEY AND LOUISA 34Fritzens’ show rules permit each rider only one entry per test, therefore Kristy and Louisa competed in the qualifier for the Freestyle, doing the same FEI test in front of the same judges. They scored 63.98% for 11th place.

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EVENTING

I am 21, from the Swan Valley in Western Australia. Mum got me into pony club from very early on, that’s where it all started. I did everything, a lot of Prince Phillip Games Mounted Games up to international level, and then when I turned fourteen or fifteen, I decided that eventing was it. I still do a little bit of everything else, but I have been sticking with eventing for a while now and I still love it. Who has been helping you along the way?I have been working with Sonja Johnson for quite a few years; I had my first lesson with her before my first Pre-Novice. I also worked quite a bit with Wayne Roycroft, Brett Parbery, when I get the chance, and more recently with Christine Bates. I have been over here, with Christine, since the beginning of March. Originally I had planned to stay until Sydney, but I sort of changed my plans and now I am probably going to stay over until the end of the year. I have three horses with me, my Four-Star horse, Legal Star, and then I have two One-Star horses, KP Corrado and Two Chances. It has been good to have the three of them here with me; I have been able to work on them all.WA always had lovely horses, but they are always talking of problems with the distance and the competition. Is it that much harder to get there in WA?We do have very nice horses, a lot of good riders and very good events. I personally believe it is important to come over here. Obviously the distance is quite a limiting factor, that’s why I like to get a few events in and compete against different people, different judges, different horses and get that bit more exposure than what you get back home. I think our courses at home are definitely up to standard. But there is obviously a lot more competition over here, a lot more people. Does your involvement with horses leave you time to do a degree as well? I started one… I have got 18 months left of a Bio-Med degree,

so at some stage I need to go back and finish that. But I am not sure when… I took an extended gap year. Where I was going to Uni was well over an hour from home and by the time you factor in all the travel and the time at Uni, it was quite hard to fit it all in with the horses. I would like to go back to it, finish it at some stage, but in the meantime…How ambitious are you? Do you want to get over to Europe and go around Badminton?For sure, I think Legal Star is such a good jumper. I would like to take him overseas at some stage. I have got the two young horses, which are looking quite promising, but while I’ve got a consistent good Four-Star horse I would like to take him, but it is a huge expense, which is going to play a big part in it. I will have to plan that somehow for next year or the year after.

THE STUDENT – JESSICA MANSON

Meet Jessica Manson – the young eventer who has been steadily moving up the ranks: first a spot on the 2010 Young Rider Trans Tasman team, only two years later a fourth place in the 2012 CCI

4 Star in Adelaide, then really making herself known with second place at this year’s Sydney CCI 3 Star event, riding her tough little stockhorse, Legal Star, aka Trumby the brumby. She finished second to Olympic medallist and local hero, Shane Rose and in front of many other established stars including some trying for places in the WEG team later this year. Time to learn more about this talented young rider, her horse and her coach - WA meets NSW, or to be more accurate, WA meets WA now settled in New South Wales. We visited the trio in their preparation for the Melbourne CCI 3 Star event, they were working on Legal Star’s weak link: dressage.

Jessica Manson & Christine BatesA Teacher / Student Case Study, Part I

Story by Christopher Hector and Ute Raabe & Photos by Roz Neave


Originally from Perth, Christine moved to Sydney in 1994. She was a non-travelling reserve for the 2002 WEG and long-listed for two Olympic Games, Atlanta and Sydney. She stopped competing at high level to start a family, however, a trip to the 2008 Olympic Games re-ignited her competitive streak. Christine: I watched Australia win the silver medal and I have grown up riding with Shane, Clayton, Megan and Sonja and that was the point when I said to myself that I had more to achieve. Although it has been a long hard road back, I feel more focussed and balanced than ever before.When she is not travelling to competitions, Christine runs Bates Equestrian Australia, a successful breaking–in, training, coaching and agistment business. Days are long juggling family life with a busy competition schedule, training horses and coaching riders such as Jessica, who has been working with Christine since March. Did they know each other before?

Jess: No, I didn’t have much to do with Christine until last year. We had quite a big competition in WA, called Eventing in the Park. It was basically an Eventing Grand Prix on our foreshore. I actually lent her one of my One-Star horses to ride. That’s how I got to know her and then we got talking and I thought it would be a good idea to come here and work with her.

EVENTING

THE TEACHER – CHRISTINE BATES

Legal Star was born in Albany in Western Australia, Sonja Johnson country. Jess: He is mainly stockhorse, by a stallion called Ringwould Legality. He is not related to Jaguar, Sonja’s horse, but he was bred by the same people. We bought him as a three-year-old and he will be thirteen this year, so I’ve had him for ten years. I’ve had a long partnership with him. Jess and Legal Star just picked up 3.2 penalties for time in the cross country at Sydney – that was the second fastest time. Was the horse always a natural in the cross-country?He is a pretty reliable cross-country horse, it is probably his best phase and he is very consistent in it. Also that sort of track suited him. He is very brave but careful. And he is quite rideable so that makes it easier to make time on him. And showjumping?He is usually pretty reliable showjumping, but we had a couple down at Adelaide last year. So I have also been working on the showjumping quite a

bit with Christine and I was really happy with his round at Sydney, hopefully that’s also going in the right direction. Was the dressage always a little difficult?It has always been a little difficult. Obviously in the lower grades it hasn’t been quite so influential, but now it is something I am really trying to improve.

THE HORSE – LEGAL STAR AKA TRUMBY


BREEDING

One of Dr Nissen’s primary concerns has been the modernization of the Holsteiner horse using English Thoroughbreds, and he has brought into the breeding

program stallions like Königspark xx, Grundyman xx, Sir Shostakovich xx, Barnaul xx, Mytens xx, Parco xx, Esteban xx and Heraldik xx. He also opened the doors to foreign blood, primarily using French stallions, with Quidam de Revel now a major influence in Holstein. Famous sport horses such as Donnerhall and much later, For Pleasure and Stakkato were approved in breeding trials under his leadership. I caught up with him at Neumünster show, in the heart of Holstein, and recorded this far ranging and frank interview.Talking to breeders and breeding officials all over Europe, breeding is way down on previous years, is this downturn affecting the Holsteiner Association?“Yes. In Holstein, we have had a very good market and the breeders could sell foals for good prices, until three or four years ago, when things started to change, and the numbers started to go down every years, about 10-15%. I think it is now down about 40% in the last three or four years.”Is this the effect of the global financial crisis?“I think the financial crisis was one factor, but we should

be aware that there is a big change in social development, we have to recognize this. In Europe, society has changed, the birth rate goes down and the young people have many sport alternatives, riding and the whole horse industry has been affected by this. The time we had will not come back. A new century has begun, and we as breeding associations, and also our breeders, have to accept this, and make new breeding programs to fit this new situation.”Will there be a great reduction in mare numbers – like there was at the end of World War II?“I think in every crisis, you also have big chances to find a higher level in the quality, and that is our aim. We say to our breeders, okay, the situation is as it is, and the chance to take a profit out of this is to become better and better in the quality. We have a high level of quality in jumping in our breeding population, but when I started 20 years ago, we had 4000 brood mares, then it grew and grew, very quickly, especially from 6000 to 9000, and I think this period was too short to maintain the good quality. They produced many horses, but not with enough quality, and now it goes on, and we have around 7000 brood mares and that is a good basis, maybe six or six and a half, is also good. A lot of breeders

DR THOMAS NISSEN : THE HOLSTEIN FUTUREDr Thomas Nissen became the breeding director of the Holsteiner Association in 1989. He joined the Holsteiner Association in 1988 after completing his Agriculture degree at Kiel - the appointment was a logical next step since his thesis topic was the mare performance test and fertility of the Holsteiner horse.

An interview with Christopher Hector


DR THOMAS NISSEN : THE HOLSTEIN FUTURE

still own their brood mares, but they will not cover them. So we have 7000 broodmares but we will have around 3000 foals each year. We can only produce as many foals as the breeders can sell, but we say to our breeders, it is necessary that you hold on to your quality mare, and now it is time to bring your quality mare to a good stallion because in four years, quality riding horses will become more expensive because the numbers have gone down.”

“In Holland, Scandinavia, France, all the breeding regions, the covering rate is down 50% so in a few years we will have a small number of quality performance horses.”The strength of Holstein in the past has always been sticking to breeding jumping horses?“In the last ten, fifteen years, the other breeds have bought good genetics from the Holsteiner and a lot of very good stallions have gone to those areas, so the jumping quality grows and grows in those places – that is a problem for us. But I think it is the same situation if you have a factory for cars, if you produce a good car, like a Porsche or a Mercedes, an Audi, you have a marque, a brand image, and I hope that the marque of the Holsteiner is very popular all over the world and all breeders, who want to breed

jumping horses will come back and take the original Holsteiner again. It is necessary that we have very good breeding programs to produce more interesting horses with a better quality than anyone can find elsewhere. You can drive a Japanese car if you want, but for the people who want to express their personality, there is an identification with the branding of certain top cars, and I hope that the riders and the trainers will continue to regard the Holsteiner as the best.”For twenty, thirty years, the Holsteiner mix has been a variation on two chords: Cor de la Bryère and Capitol with the occasional Thoroughbred, will this continue to be the recipe for the future?“The Holsteiner population is a clear population, because we have unique mare lines – we will not take any mare lines from the French or the Dutch, Hanoverian, Westfalia, whatever. We only take Holsteiner mares in our breeding books, and all the mares in our books have a Stamm number. The older mare lines have numbers and you can follow those numbers through and learn something about the quality of the Holsteiner breed. We will not change that.”

“It is only some stallions that we take from outside. Thoroughbred stallions, we need the Thoroughbred to make the horses intelligent, tough and modern. We are always looking for foreign blood, and we prefer stallions from France and we are looking for them, but it is difficult because every breed, the Dutch, the Belgian, all the German breeds, they go around the world looking for interesting blood, and with the globalization and the flow of information on the internet, it is very hard to find an exclusive source of new blood anywhere. We need to add fresh influences to our population with stallions from outside.”Were you surprised by the success of Baloubet? “We took Baloubet years ago in our breeding program. It is not easy, he is a little bit of a strong, heavy type with not so good a face, and he needs special mares. There is no discussion, he is one of the best, if not the best, producer of jumping horses in the world. We look for this blood, our Association has a son, Baracuda, out of a Contender mare. He is a lovely type, he has a good face, not too heavy, he is a good jumper and we try it with him. We have approved grandsons, like Balou’s Bellini, by Paul Schockemöhle’s stallion, Balou du Rouet. It is a very nice stallion, he is out of a Holsteiner mare by Lord Incipit.”How important do you think it is that a stallion should be a good competitor himself? Baloubet was a fabulous competitor, but Balou was pretty ‘normal’, is that a big factor for you when you look at a stallion?“I think there is also a danger in that we live in this era of globalization, we live in a total information society, and the danger is that only a handful of breeders can handle this information. A lot of them look and say, oh how nice, he is in competition, that is the stallion for my mare, they look on the internet for the dealer and buy the semen on the internet. They never look at the stallion live, and say, okay, is he the right stallion for my mare or not? I think that is necessary. If you go back 30 years or so, there was no artificial insemination, and the breeders had to go to the stallion station to look at the stallion, okay this stallion is right for my mare – and I think we bred better horses than today. Today everyone says the best stallions are in competition, Baloubet, Quick Star, Kannan…”

BREEDING

Phot

o: Ja

nne

Bugt

rup


JUMPING

C olleen says Illumination has been a delight to work with: “He has a lovely nature and he is jumping 90cm -1m. Liz rode him in a one day event last week and he

galloped very well. She said he gave her a good ride around the cross country.”

“The horse learns to respond to a single leg aid. First the horse must move the hind leg across, then turn around the forehand step by step. A quarter turn is two steps, start with small expectations and your horse will have a go. It is the rider’s timing that is crucial to the success of any exercise. The rider must not contort their body and the horse must move his.”

Liz looks happy with what is happening so far, it is early days.

How long does it take before the horse looks like the finished article?

“That depends how consistent and patient the rider is. A tense tight rider is not going to be able to feel what the horse is offering. Be happy with small gains, lots of small gains add up. When you start to teach your horse this exercise, you must ask consistently with the same aids on the same side and repeat until the horse offers promptly, only then should you teach the exercise on the other side.”

“Hopefully you might go for a trot before you tackle the other side or better still wait until another day… Normally it is the rider who runs out of patience first.”

“The horse has learned the exercise when you can repeat without major mistakes. Every book, every trainer, I have ever read / listened to has given that sort of advice about training horses / people.”

Colleen stresses that straight lines and turns need to be schooled at home.

Jumping trainer and all-round horseperson, Colleen Brook, helps her daughter Lizzie Koob, as she accustoms Illumination to his new life off-the-track…

RELAXING THE RacehorseStory by Chris Hector and Photos by Roz Neave

The Format: The session started with a simple exercise – turn on the forehand - we see various forms of this exercise at the beginning of many lessons.

It’s very good for horses like Illumination, Colleen tells us, it gets the horse listening to the rider’s leg, something racehorses are not so used to…

BACKGROUND: Illumination is by Encosta de Lago, from a mare with Biscay and In the Purple bloodlines.

He is 6 years old and about 16 hands.

“Liz is trotting over the pole and her position with her upper body is good. The rider must be leaning forward in front of the vertical so any upward lift by the horse to go over poles is easy for the rider to absorb. If the rider is upright they will fall behind the movement, pull on the reins for balance and bang on the horse’s back. Liz’s reins need to be shortened by 5cm to have the perfect mouth, hand, elbow line. Her eyes are good, if we are particular, she could allow more weight down into her heels so her heels are lower than her toes. Yes, always practicing.”

POLE POSITION


Brownie points if you recognise the rider

EXERCISES TO HELP IMPROVE THE RIDER’S LEG1. Sitting trot with and without stirrups, regularly.

2. Trot in to small jumps concentrating on heels down only.

3. Rein release practice, the hands forward and down towards the horse's mouth will also help the rider stabilize and rely on the leg for support.The rider’s position is all interconnected.

GOING STRAIGHT“Jumping riders usually train in a big area, and accuracy, or the lack of it, becomes an issue. Lots of circles are ridden, but not many turns or straight lines. The T poles give you a specific place to do something. The two poles side by side are approximately 1m - 1.10m apart, the third pole forming the T is 2m away. You can practice transitions through the two poles to help keep you straight, use them like dressage markers. We train walk, halts, rein back between those poles, you can trot the T rail and halt between the two poles. Canter over the pole, transition down to trot either way, keep the eyes up and forward. Light seat, upright seat, you can trot across the two poles slowly, then pick up canter and ride through the two poles. You can angle the single pole either way. I love the pole work, that is my dressage!”

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Horse Magazine August 2014