I had the great pleasure last week of auditing a clinic with George Morris at Persimmon Tree Farm in Westminster, Maryland. Holly was there too. She audited all three days as part of the USHJA trainer certification program while I came on the second day only. Most of my readers will probably know who George Morris is and how he is significant to our sport. If you are a rider and don’t know who George Morris is, or you’ve heard of him but don’t really understand what he has done, it is worthwhile to look him up. He didn’t exactly invent the sport of hunter/jumper riding in this country, but no one has done more than him to shape modern hunter/jumper riding in the United States. The way he has done this, I believe, is by being a great teacher who has produced many great teachers. Because he has created many good teachers, his style has spread like wildfire throughout the hunter/jumper community. Oddly, many of the concepts Morris taught at the clinic and his way of going about schooling horse and rider were familiar to me even though I’ve never seen the man before in my life. The reason was that most of my long-term instructors, were trained in the Morrissian style. In fact, I think that most of the quality instructors in this country were trained in the same way, if not by Morris himself, then by his students.

It’s also worth mentioning that Morris basically wrote the bible of hunter seat equitation. It’s called, not surprisingly, “Hunter Seat Equitation.” I have had a copy since I was a kid and read it cover to cover at least three times, going back to reference certain sections when I need them. If you don’t own a copy, I highly suggest that you get yourself on Amazon.com and buy one tonight! It is the only book on equitation I own, and quite frankly, the only one I need.

I watched about six hours of teaching at this clinic, so I’ll just try to relay what I think were the key take home messages. Morris placed a tremendous emphasis in all three groups he taught on impulsion and forward motion. Without impulsion, he said, you have nothing. One of the exercises he set was a two stride to a three stride with a wide triple bar as the first jump, then a single, then a square oxer. The jumps were set on a horse show step (35’ to 47’). He wanted the horses to really gallop forward. He despises the backward, sleepy rides of the modern hunter ring. He explained that soft arms make a good distance at the jumps. He encouraged riders to push their horses forward through the turn and then soften their arms so not to hinder the horse in finding a distance. And if a spot was wrong? Well, he said “make a decision and live with it.” Even if the spot was too long or short, he wanted riders to be decisive and follow through. The rider must produce the pace to the jump, but the horse must learn to be self-sufficient at the jump. Morris did not want to see riders continually picking at their horses in front of the fence. Rather, he wanted the rider to set the horse up with a good pace and track, but it was the horse’s job to actually jump the fence and the rider’s job to go with him. Also about finding distances Morris said, “if you see the distance move up, if you don’t, wait.” Morris likes a bold, forward ride, so it is no wonder he likes a good thoroughbred. There were several at the clinic. “I can smell a thoroughbred,” he said, admiring a tall young bay in the 2’6” group. He continued on to lament that we have a surplus of talented ex-thoroughbred racehorses in America and it is a pity that we are not utilizing them more often. He dislikes how the use of heavier warmblood breeds have influenced the sport.

Morris also placed an emphasis on equitation, correcting equitation flaws in the riders even though many were quite accomplished. Throughout the day, he told several riders to fix how their foot was placed in the stirrup to make their legs “prettier.” To be a great rider, he told them, “focus on the details.” He also noted that when the upper body is vertical, in the walk or canter, for example, it should actually be angled slightly in front of the vertical in order to “go with” the horse.  One rider in the 2’6” group was a ducker who severely over-exaggerated her two-point position. “Acrobatics! Unnecessary acrobatics!” He shouted. “The upper body should do nothing.” Throughout the course of her session, the rider was able to correct her ducking habit with Morris’ help.

Morris had the more advanced groups jump a liverpool. Some of the horses refused the unfamiliar water jump. One horse threw it’s rider during a refusal and then threw the professional rider who got on to school it. However, the horse was not allowed to get out of jumping the obstacle. It was asked to jump a tarp and then finally the liverpool again. Morris said that jumping the liverpool was about challenging the horses and riders. He prides himself in finding challenges, even for the most accomplished riders in the world, in order to improve their skills. He also said of the riders falling off, that while instructors should not want riders to fall off, it is an inevitable part of the sport and that riders should be prepared for it. Morris also worked on the automatic crest release with the advanced group. To perform the release, he had them ride through a low gymnastic line and told them to think of lowering their hands while maintaining direct contact with the horse’s mouth. I found this to be a useful cue and tried practicing the automatic release on Patrick when I got home. Another exercise I used when I got home was a figure eight over a single square oxer. Holly has had me do a figure eight pattern over a single jump before, but I found that adding the square oxer really sharpened Patrick up. In the advanced group, Morris encouraged riders to angle the jump (which was about 3’6” in height) and to make the circles of the eight smaller and smaller. It was a pleasure to watch the advanced group ride. All or most of the four riders were professionals who were exemplary riders.

At the end of the day, Morris addressed the auditors with some closing remarks. I feel that he was speaking, in particular, to the coaches who are responsible for developing future riders. He said that working with riders over low jumps was useful, but “our goal is higher [fences].” He favors a strict, no-nonsense, and brutally honest teaching style. Throughout the day, he said that many American riders are “desperate housewives” and “Pampered! pampered, all of them!” He doesn’t believe that riders should be handled with kid gloves, but rather, that they should be challenged.

He talked about the two types of fear, physical fear and emotional fear. He explained that physical fear is a fear of getting injured and is valid, while emotional fear is the fear of making a mistake and has no place in riding. “Emotional fear is rampant in this country,” he said. Even though physical fear is valid, he said that riders must constantly fight it. He noted that some riders have more physical fear than others. Of his personal experience he said, “I had to ride horses, but I was scared to death. I fought chicken.”

My impression is that George Morris is probably most interested in getting his message out to professionals who are responsible for training other riders and to riders who are in a position to climb to the upper levels of the sport. I think that is an appropriate mindset for someone in his position. He is looking at the big picture for the sport. However, he treated all of the riders and horses in his clinic with the same level of dignity and gave them all a great lesson regardless of whether they were pros or “desperate housewives.”

So what can somebody like me take away from this experience? While I have goals, they are fairly humble. I do not intend to climb to the upper echelons of the sport. What I got out of this clinic was that I need to keep stretching myself and my horse and getting outside of my comfort zone. This might mean doing bigger or different fences than I’m used to or exercises that are harder than I’m used to. I need to keep checking myself so that I don’t get sloppy with the details of my equitation. Morris’ message about fighting physical fear also struck home. As most of you know by now, I’m kind of a chicken. In order to accomplish my goals I will have to keep fighting the legitimate worry about getting hurt. I know that if you gallop at a big oxer and worry about getting hurt, it might not end well. That’s a given. However, it was comforting to know that I’m not alone in the struggle against physical fear and that many accomplished riders also struggle to control this emotion. After watching the clinic, I felt bold and inspired. I went home and had a great ride.

Holly and I formulated a plan a few weeks ago to take Patrick to the Maryland Horse and Pony Show. This show is a very nice, USEF recognized, “AA” rated show that is held at our home venue, the Prince George Equestrian Center. We decided to ship Patrick in for the day only to ride in the local hunter divisions, which took place back to back, first thing in the morning. I would ride him in the 2’6” and then she would ride him in the 3’ division. My truck was still broken, so luckily, my barn buddies, Margaret and Wade agreed to trailer us. This was fairly saintly of them since they weren’t taking their own horses and we had to leave at 5:20 in the morning. Boy, was I grateful!

I braided and bathed Patrick myself, which meant I had to get up at the ungodly hour of 2:50 AM. It had been a long time since I had to get up that early for a show, although I went to bed early, so it wasn’t too bad. I trudged out into his paddock at about 3:20 to fetch him. It was so dark that I had to approach each of the three bays in the field to figure out which one was him. Of course he was the last one I looked at in the very back of the pasture, but when he saw me, he marched right up to me with his ears pricked. It was very cute.

I was pleased with my bathing and braid job. It was the first time I had braided Patrick and he looked quite handsome. The braids were neat, even and not distracting which I was glad about. Being able to do my own braiding is a big money saver which might even allow me to do more shows. “Well” I said, “if things go terribly awry at the show, at least we’ll still look good.”

I was worried about how things might go because the temperature had dropped about twenty degrees overnight. It was like someone flipped a switch and suddenly summer turned to fall. Luckily Patrick was unfazed. He was very calm all day and acted like a real pro.

I have been riding and showing since I was a kid, but this was my first USEF rated show. If you’ve never done one, let me tell you, it’s a different world. The classes are basically the same, the rings are the same, but that’s about where it ends. When we arrived before the show, there were horses being lunged in circles everywhere, clearly by grooms and not by owners or riders. The permanent stalls were all decorated with banners, tack trunks and coolers in the stables’ colors. Blinged out golf carts zoomed by, carrying people in breeches and designer sunglasses with their packs of fashionable dogs. The horses were all big, beautiful and warmblood-like, basically without exception. With the arrival of “the A Show people” and their horses and their stuff, the whole ambiance of our familiar showground had changed. The whole place reeked of money. It was a little surreal for me, who had only spectated shows of this quality in the past, to step into the ring on a horse I owned and actually compete against “the A Show People.”

The local divisions were large because “local” was considered to be within one hundred miles of the showground. There is a lot of good horseflesh within that radius. There were many pros riding extremely good quality horses. It looked like they might be using the local divisions as a warm-up for other divisions. There were about 30 horses in the 2’6” division and about 25 in the 3’. I had expected the divisions to be a mix of the really nice horses that were at the show for other divisions and a few horses of lesser quality that you wouldn’t normally see at an “A” show, but that wasn’t the case. The horses were top quality across the board. Holly and I had good, respectable over fences rounds. Each round had a least one minor mistake which could put us out of the ribbons. Holly had one 3’ round that we thought was good enough to place, but it didn’t. Of course, we didn’t feel disappointed because competition was fierce and Patrick had really done his job well. Who could complain?

However, we didn’t walk away empty handed. Patrick is exceptionally talented in the hack. He’s an A++ mover and he couldn’t care less about the traffic in a crowded hack class. I walk into my division hack confident of this fact. Holly’s major advice to me beforehand was to stay to the inside track of the ring where I could be seen the best by the judge. “Do not go on the rail. Ever.” She told me.

The class got underway. I steered Patrick around the other horses as if they weren’t even there, staying to the inside track. We extended the trot up each long side of the ring. His canter departs were prompt and flawless. I let all of his gaits be forward beyond my comfort zone. I asked him to tuck in his nose very slightly but otherwise left him in his natural frame. It was such a big class that we hacked at each gait for a long time. He was so perfect and consistent in his responses that it was like driving a machine, not riding a horse. Lining up, I knew it was the best I’d ever showed off any horse in any hack I’d ever ridden in. I also was prepared not to get a ribbon because, well, that’s out of my control. The announcer began calling the class. Sure enough, first through fifth walked away to collect their ribbons. All professionals, we thought, on hulking warmbloods. Then they call our number! Sixth place in a highly competitive hack class of twenty? I’ll take it. I knew that we did a great job, but it was really nice to be recognized by the judge for our effort. That little green ribbon is on my mantle! Holly went on to ride to 7th place in her flat class too. So we have ribbons from our first “A” show. Patrick was great and after that experience, I don’t think there is any hunter show in America where I would take him and feel outclassed. Of course, I have a lot more learning to do, and I prefer to do it primarily at the local shows which are cheaper and more accessible. I’m feeling comfortable competing at 2’6” at this point, so over the winter, I will continue working on my goal to compete at higher fence heights in hope that I’ll eventually feel comfortable competing at 3’. However, the Maryland Horse and Pony Show was a fantastic experience and I think the “A” circuit hasn’t seen the last of us!