Hello
Someone wrote recently, after Ros Canter won on a horse she’d only ridden for a very short time, that they’d prefer to build a relationship with a horse first. I can absolutely see that, and I’m SO enjoying that luxury now. Hugo, Blondie and Pie are all visible from the house so I can spend the maximum time with them. After 26 years together, Pie and I are like an old married couple; Blondie was just born delightful, and Hugo now neighs to me like the other two. He’s retained his character but has become far more gentle.
But for much of my working life I didn’t have that luxury. Quite often I had to meet a horse and get to some sort of understanding VERY quickly. When we ran the practical courses at Witney, we used to set about disproving that saying, “you can’t teach feel”. I still think you can, although I’ll admit it takes some depth and you are entitled to say it’s even trickier helping people understand it online see: Online Horse Psychology 🙂.
So this has caused me to go into my head a bit and see if I can pull out what some of those skills actually are. What qualities do you need to get the best from a horse very quickly? I had to do this, for one reason or another, over a number of decades, and I’m thinking back now to what it felt like for me. It might be just as relevant if you’ve got one horse for life.
You can stop here if you like because I’d say the most important thing is to Pay Attention.
Let’s say you’re riding a horse you don’t know in a race. You get a leg up in the paddock and then you’re cantering down to the start on an animal you may barely know. I guess the first thing is you need a reasonable amount of confidence in what you’re doing. You need to be fit, clear thinking, and you need the answers to quite a few “what ifs”. Whether real or imagined, I think you also need to have a belief in yourself and in this horse.
Out of interest to me, can you imagine yourself being put on a strange horse and cantering down to where the race starts? Think about how you’d feel, and then imagine instead that you “know” you’re on the best horse, you love this horse, even though you’ve only just met, and you’ve got a strong feeling you’re in this together. That was definitely a feeling that helped me make things work. I won 25 races on the Flat and over jumps as an Amateur. Not exactly Frankie Dettori, but Raceform said I had an above-average strike rate, so I’ll take that.
At those times your brain and body are going into Pattern Recognition. If he pulls a bit you need to settle him; if he’s laid back you may need to “test your engines” for a few strides, as my Dad used to call it. Professional jockeys will be riding several different horses a day, and I imagine they each build up their own systems until a lot of it becomes automatic.
And I wonder if quite a lot of what we call “feel” is actually the brain quietly saying, “I’ve seen something like this before.” Not certainty, but recognition. This horse feels a bit like that one. This change in rhythm usually means something. That tiny change in the rein may matter. After enough horses, you start noticing things before you’re even consciously aware you’ve noticed them.
Perhaps the really experienced horseperson doesn’t become quicker to assume. They become quicker to notice.
Now let’s say it’s a demo situation and you’re handed a horse for the first time in front of a big crowd. Monty and I would watch the horses being checked for soundness in the afternoon but not touch them. So in the evening you have the horse in a correctly fitted Dually halter and a long line, so if the horse suddenly goes to shoot off somewhere you don’t get dragged along. Again, you’ve already gone through the “what ifs” and you have techniques available if you need them.
The first thing I’d probably suggest in this situation is long strokes on the horse’s neck and helping him to match your breathing. Slow breaths in, long breaths out. Again you need that feeling of confidence within you. And if you want to ask the Universe for assistance as well – I’m all for it.
One of the trickiest things to explain is the need to be completely absorbed in the horse you’re with and ignoring everything outside, while at the same time explaining what you’re doing to an audience. In a demo you’ve got helpers setting up a course for you so you can see how this horse reacts from the tiniest challenge, say just choosing to touch his nose on the ramp, and then gradually building up from there.
So I think “feel” may be less mysterious than we sometimes make it sound. It’s paying attention. It’s competence gradually becoming confidence. It’s doing your “what if” thinking beforehand. It’s recognising patterns without assuming this horse will be exactly like the last one. It’s being completely on the horse’s side. And I do think it helps to love the horse you’ve got in front of you, even if you’ve only just met.
Personally whenever I feel ‘up against it’ it helps me to feel I’m guided somehow. But maybe that’s just me.
Lots of Love
Kelly xxx
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