It was fun catching up with some Danish pals at Aachen, Daniel Bachmann Andersen and his wife Tiril Anerud, and Daniel’s mentor, Princess Nathalie… (Photo – Rebecca Ashton)
Young Danish rider, Daniel Bachmann Andersen is back on the international dressage scene, and how! Things were a little quiet for the likeable Dane after he left Blue Hors, but now he is looking to the future with an exciting team.
Daniel and Vayron, the horse that blew me away at Aachen (Photo – DaydreamEquine)
“I have four Grand Prix horses,” he told me when we met up at Aachen. “Two are up-and-coming, just doing National shows, while two are now confirmed on the international level.”
Daniel and Zippo (photo – Kenneth Braddick – Dressage News)
One is Zippo, he’s a Zack / Don Schufro, eleven-year-old gelding, he’s doing really well, he went to a few of the bigger World Cups this year, and was actually qualified for the final, but I decided not to go because it was his first year of Grand Prix, and maybe it was not ideal for his to travel that far. So we decided to stay home, which was fine. He just won last week in Hagen at the Three-Star there, and now in two weeks I go to Falsterbo for the Nations Cup.
Vayron (Photo – Rebecca Ashton)
Then I have Vayron, I have ridden him for a year now, and he has been going Grand Prix for just half a year.”
(Photo – DaydreamEquine)
How many centimetres high is he?
“To be honest I think he is 187.”
(Photo – DaydreamEquine)
Wow, you’ve finally found one that’s big enough – Daniel is very tall…
“He’s big enough, he’s so incredible. The horse has such big gaits and is so gentle, still can be small, and can be quick. That is amazing. He’s a special horse but he is not one that you can push the buttons and then he goes, he’s a stallion, he has to respect you but still trust you, that’s a fine line. You cannot just go on full power, you have to ask, is he with you mentally, and that’s why I am really happy to be able to ride the Four-star here instead of the Five-star. It would be completely higher pressure in the Five-star, there you always want to ride for your team.”
“It’s so nice to be here just for myself and for him. It’s his first Grand Prix season and even to be able to go to Aachen is a big thing, so I was pretty happy for him that we could do the Four-star not the Five-star.”
Daniel and Vayron in the 4*, they finished third on a score of 75.131, first with one judge, 10th with another, the judging at Aachen was all over the place. (Photo – Rebecca Ashton)
“The way he has been going, he could have been in the Five-Star, but for his development, I am very happy to do Four-Star and maybe next year he can do the Five-Star when he is even more developed, and even more ready for it mentally.”
(Photo – Rebecca Ashton)
Have you got anyone helping you with your training where you are now?
“Yes, I have Nathalie, zu Sayn-Wittgenstein, she’s helping me a lot. Regularly once a month she comes to my barn and helps me a whole day, then she comes in at night and we have dinner together and discuss a lot of things. We always have a good time, then she sleeps at our house, and the next day we train the whole day. We’ve developed so that any day, even if she is not there, I ride like she is, but when she comes, and I have the mike on, she helps me, with the young horses, the older horses, with everything I have. In the past when I had a trainer come, they mostly picked out that, that, that, to ride, and often the younger ones were left a little bit out. In this way, I just ride like I would anyway. That’s nice, she sees them all, some are only twenty minutes, some longer, it’s such a lovely way of training together. We’ve been training together for quite a long time now.”
“Before with Lars Pedersen, I was at Blue Hors, and when I stopped Blue Hors, I was with Nathalie and it works very well for me to train with a woman, as I have the power of a man to ride, but I have learned that if you can ride with the power of a man but the feeling of a woman, that’s great. That’s why I wanted to train with a woman, I’ve never trained with a woman before.”
I’ve watched Nathalie train quite a lot, and it always seems that she is training from the inside, she’s done it herself…
“Yes, totally and she can really relate to what you go through. When you are at the shows she’s still riding actively herself and competing. And she can get on your horse, that is so worthwhile, so different to someone who is not riding any more.”
“She is also always open, open to different angles, it’s not just one system that they have to be put into. More in, more out, riding with one hand, we do everything that we can possibly get into our heads to try, and we do so much funny stuff, and you can feel sometimes, that’s it, that’s it. I’m also very open minded for everything, whenever I’ve got a horse that doesn’t work, I am so happy to find the key.”
(Photo – Rebecca Ashton)
With Vayron were there issues you had to work through?
“There are always issues. For me definitely, it was to be able to trust myself and believe in myself enough. That I could actually say to myself, this is where I am, and I don’t care what people think about me any more. I don’t look around any more and say, shit they are all looking at me, should I change something. Now I’ve come to the point where I really believe in what I am doing, and I don’t change for anyone. I do my own thing, and that I can definitely feel in the horses because they have more self-esteem through that.”
“With riding generally, I feel not having to prove anymore that you belong to this top sport, has made me a better rider. For years at Blue Hors I was having to prove that I belong in the better part of the dressage world. Now I feel I’ve kind of landed there, and established myself, even though I stopped at Blue Hors, and I had to build up better horses. Marshall got sold last year, still having new ones coming up, doing it again and again. For me, that’s a good rider, the one that can bring out new horses and get them into the top level, not just one horse, but many horses.”