{"id":19371,"date":"2014-12-29T09:51:19","date_gmt":"2014-12-28T22:51:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/?p=19371"},"modified":"2015-01-22T07:12:14","modified_gmt":"2015-01-21T20:12:14","slug":"craig-and-prue-barrett-part-4-an-eventing-education","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/2014\/12\/craig-and-prue-barrett-part-4-an-eventing-education\/","title":{"rendered":"Craig and Prue Barrett – Part 4 – An eventing education"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"JackaminTitlep42\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Winning the three star at Adelaide in 1999 \u2013 Prue and Jackamin<\/em><\/p>\n

Story \u2013 Chris Hector &\u00a0Photos \u2013 Roz Neave<\/h3>\n

After the disappointment of being so close to a medal at The Hague, Prue did everything right in the run up to the Sydney Games, with the most unlikely candidate for eventing honours, the little Thoroughbred, Wendella Jackaman:<\/p>\n

\u201cThe whole thing with Jackaman was a bit of a fairy story. Henry Hicks bought him for his wife Helen when he\u2019d been celebrating at a country race meeting. He swore he was 16.2 when he bought him but he was 15.1 when he got him home! Helen sent him to me to ride when she was having a baby, it was their idea to take him Novice, so I said, okay.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHe won three Novices straight up, then he went Intermediate straight away. I said – ‘oh yeah, he\u2019ll cope with Intermediate’, and they were a bit nervous about that. Then I took off and went overseas with High Opportunity in the run up to the WEG in Rome, and so Jackaman didn\u2019t get worked. Then when I came home I took him to the first event in the Holden Series, and he won that at Kooralbyn, and with that win, I started to think, \u2018this could be quite serious\u2019. That was the turning point.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was amazing. He is the most amazing ride cross-country. If I thought it, he did it. He definitely had the benefit of more years of experience on my part too. Navarone, he copped a real amateur rider and he still went to the world championships! Hopefully by the time I got to Jackaman I had learned a bit more…\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Jackamin2Page42\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Magic cross country \u2013 Jackamin on course at Werribee in 1999\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

Then six weeks out of the Games, Jackaman developed a life threatening illness, for weeks the vets battled to save him, but Prue\u2019s hopes of competing for her country, in her country, were gone.<\/p>\n

\u201cBy the time the Sydney Olympics came, that was a terrible disappointment. I always felt dreadful that something had happened to Helen and Henry\u2019s horse, but when you look at the big picture, it was pretty phenomenal for the horse to go as far as he did. And now he has recovered, Helen is riding him, and he\u2019s doing medium \/ advanced dressage\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

But it could have been a gold medal on the mantle\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cIt would have been nice. I can remember walking the course at Sydney and I was missing the feeling of him going up another level. I\u2019d ridden him from Pre-Novice to Novice and he just did it like that. Novice to Intermediate, whenever you went up a grade, you never felt the transition. I remember when he missed out on doing the 4 Star, I thought, it would have been so good to have that feeling on him, because I think it probably still would have felt like riding Pre-Novice. You can\u2019t describe that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI remember well after Sydney, when he was back in work, Helen sent him to me, and I thought – \u2018oh I\u2019ve just got to jump him a little bit\u2019 and I came down to this double and BANG he just left the ground. I thought, see I wasn\u2019t having myself on, this horse is just a jack in a box. Really genuine.\u201d<\/p>\n

So do you have ambitions of finding another one of them \u2013 another international competitor?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you have had one that was so good\u2026 they\u2019d have to give you that special feeling to try and do it again.\u201d<\/p>\n

But are you happy at home with the babies?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cI am happy at home no doubt about it. Who knows what horse is going to come up. You\u2019ve just got to have that feeling. I\u2019m not out there hunting for a three or four year-old to take me to the next World Champs, not actively \u2013 I\u2019ve got Staccato wound up now to do a bit of dressage, and that\u2019s exciting. I\u2019ll probably get shot down in flames for saying dressage is easier, but it is easier with the children. Going to an event is like a military exercise, whereas the dressage, the longest I\u2019d have to drive is to Sydney, two and a half hours. I can do the whole competition in a day and come back. Logistically it is easier for me. Craig tells me I am allowed to go Medium this year, as long as I go Prix St Georges, next year.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m definitely still competitive, I\u2019ll never lose that. I\u2019m stoking up to do dressage \u2013 I\u2019m not going there to do a bad test that\u2019s for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"StaccatoP43\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Craig and Prue\u2019s stallion, Stakkato, on course at Werribee. Stakkato currently leads the official World Breeding Federation for Sport Horses stallion standings for eventing.<\/em><\/p>\n

Craig are you still looking for the international superstar?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cAbsolutely. I\u2019ll definitely ride for Australia, that\u2019s pretty much the reason why we still do it. I think riders like Andrew Hoy and Clayton Fredericks, they inspire you. I\u2019m not saying they are old, but Andrew\u2019s not getting any younger, Clayton has been around as long as I have. No one ever stops looking for it.\u201d<\/p>\n

And now you are trying to breed them yourself?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cI enjoy the breeding. I would like to think that we can produce homebred Olympic Games horses. That\u2019s definitely a goal. You\u2019d love to ride one, but I\u2019m not saying I\u2019m not going to ride them if we didn\u2019t breed them\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

When will the first of your breeding program come on line?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got Sandhills Marnie CHECK, he just won the 3 Star One Day event at Scone and Stewart Tinney has a mare, Panmira CHECK that has just done a 2 Star 3DE, and you can just bet it will be 3 Star next year. They are up there and running. We still sell them, so it\u2019s the ones you can\u2019t sell that we keep and train and get to Advanced level.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"SandhillsMarnieP44\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Sandhills Marnie and Craig \u2013 Adelaide 2005<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cLike Sandhills Benson, the one in our little breaker session \u2013 I think he could go Advanced. He\u2019s very much thrown to the Thoroughbred in the way it wants to behave. It\u2019s sharp, it\u2019s quick, but it is in a bit of a Warmblood\u2019s body, so you will canter down the centre line and you won\u2019t have to be flapping or kicking to keep it going. And thanks to its breeding you will have a double handful on the cross country because it will want to go \u2013 but you will have the scope of a Warmblood jumper, a bit more rideability than the hot Thoroughbred that has been on the racetrack. Plus you\u2019ll have a bit more \u2018gee he\u2019s a nice mover\u2019 in the dressage.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s what you need now. If you don\u2019t have something with an 8 for a walk, 7 or 8 for the trot, and an 8 for canter, staring you in the face as a two-year-old, you are not going to improve it. What the dressage judges in the eventing are saying is \u2013 I don\u2019t want to put words in their mouths \u2013 but it is almost like a young Dressage horse class. It\u2019s got to move nice, it\u2019s got to look lovely, and it\u2019s got to be soft to ride, rah rah rah. Again I\u2019m treading on dangerous territory, but I don\u2019t believe the eventing dressage judges are rewarding collection, not rewarding real dressage training unless it is in a very nice package.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI could get shot down in flames for saying that sort of thing but I have just watched the Badminton dressage tests and I think they are riding much more like pure dressage, much more active than they used to be. The trot is a little quicker, and the canter is a little quicker and they are a little bit more lively and that\u2019s the way you\u2019ve got to go with the higher level dressage movements.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cUnless you have the horse that is going to give you those marks straight up, I don\u2019t think you are going to train it to do a good enough trot, don\u2019t think you are going to get away with a bad walk, or an average canter. Now I\u2019m talking about Olympic Games horses here, and if you are trying to pick one now, you\u2019ve got to be a lot fussier with their paces than we were in the past.\u201d<\/p>\n

Prue: \u201cYou can\u2019t score a 35 when the horse is never going to be better than a 5. That\u2019s the bottom line, if you are going to need an 8 walk, trot and canter AND you\u2019ve got to train it well.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"BreakingP44\"<\/a><\/p>\n

BREAKING IN<\/h2>\n

If you breed horses, one day they have to be broken in. When we visited, one of Craig\u2019s tasks for the day was working with the three-year-old.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe bred him. He\u2019s out of a mare by Pride of Killeena. The mare was apparently a bit difficult to ride, but I like the breeding because there have been some good Pride of Killeena jumpers in Queensland. Kevin McNab had Taj Maraj – who went round Adelaide countless times with him \u2013 she was a lovely jumper. This is the first foal for this mare, it\u2019s three-years-old now. I\u2019ve been breaking it in very slowly \u2013 it\u2019s our horse so it goes to the end of the list each day, and just gets worked when I can get to it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s just got a fantastic walk and trot, super canter. It\u2019s always good when once you get on and ride them, they are still nice. We\u2019re just hoping he does the job, because breeding eventers is a bit of a lucky dip. There\u2019s a lot of variables you\u2019ve got to cover \u2013 there\u2019s infinite possibilities and combinations.\u201d<\/p>\n

You like to long rein the babies?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cI like to long rein them simply because you need to be able to turn and stop when you get on them. I also like to long rein them in the open, because some of them when they get out in an open space and they get a fright, they go \u2013 and you don\u2019t want to be sitting on them unless they stop and turn. It just lets you know what they are going to be like when you take them out in the open.\u201d<\/p>\n

You have to be careful with long reining \u2013 especially with babies you can be so strong that you can tip them over?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cIf you do that, you\u2019ve been too tough. I certainly don\u2019t get to that point. We don\u2019t use side reins when break them in. We only turn them. We don\u2019t necessarily mouth them in the traditional sense. We only get them to stop and turn, and I think that stops a lot of the panic. If they are not fixed, they don\u2019t tend to panic as much. Long reining is just a good way of knowing what they are going to do when you get them out, before you get on them. You can put a little bit of pressure on them, you can let the ropes flap around their back legs, you can pull them around. They can get a fright and you are just not up there on top of them, ready to go.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just a way of putting some pressure on, before you get on them, to see their reaction.\u201d<\/p>\n

And you make sure you don\u2019t get your face kicked in, like poor Shane Rose?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cPoor Shane, that was horrendous. Absolutely, I was doing the breaking in probably a week after he went to hospital and I was on a young horse \u2013 third ride \u2013 and I just cut a few corners and just took it a bit cheap. I was in a hurry and this horse took three steps of walk and absolutely let drive \u2013 it went up so high that when it came down it crumpled on landing, and I thought, right. I\u2019ve swung my leg over to get off, but the adrenalin was pumping so fast that I\u2019d hung on to the pommel the way the buckjumpers do when they buck \u2013 I got off, but my right hand was stuck on the pommel. I\u2019m going, \u2018this can\u2019t be good\u2019, and it\u2019s bucked again, my hand has gone up with the pommel and the saddle, and it\u2019s just come off, and both back legs came straight at me. One got me on the shoulder and the other one got me on the ribs, and all I could think of as I saw them coming was Shane.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt happens so easily. It is a dangerous game breaking in. I don\u2019t do a lot of it. At the moment I only do horses from people I know. Horses that have had some handling. The Thoroughbreds who have been through the yearling sales are fine because they\u2019ve had a lot of handling. The worst ones are the ones that have never seen a white man. They turn up on a cattle truck and don\u2019t have halters on. You just don\u2019t want those \u2013 you leave those to the real pros.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI just do the ones that are going to be easy. I like the dressage ones. Two year olds that have been handled a lot by their owners. People say they spoil them but for breaking in, they actually do a wonderful job \u2013 you can flop all over them and they just think you are spoiling them like the owner did…\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"CraiTeachesP46\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Craig takes a lesson with Jess and Raquel Robson<\/h2>\n

It was time to try out the new arena at Sandhills, and while the howling wind was doing its best to make the place live up to its name, there was no doubting the focus of the two young riders on the surface. Two sisters, Jess and Raquel Robson\u00a0on a lovely almost matching pair of chestnut ex-racehorses \u2013 Forrest and\u00a0Sincere Magic, or Reggie as he is known at home…<\/p>\n

They are the sort of pupils every trainer would love to teach \u2013 dedicated, disciplined, and trying ever so hard to get it right. Fifteen-year-old Jess is riding Reggie, the more recent refugee from the race-track, not that Craig works any softer on her on that account, although he admits that this one is \u2018a bit more difficult to persuade he can do dressage\u2026\u2019<\/p>\n

Thirteen-year-old Raquel\u2019s horse is a real little star and ends the session demonstrating flying changes on a twenty metre circle from true canter to counter canter!<\/p>\n

\u201cRaquel and Jess Robson \u2013 their mother rode and she was a really keen rider, she used to bolt around the streets of Branxton and Greta, wild as all getup. Jess is a very good rider, if you had a difficult horse, you would always put Jess on it. She has a natural ability to let the horse do what it wants to do, and look after it really nicely. Right now Jess\u2019s horse is out, so she is riding one of her mum\u2019s horses \u2013 a five-year-old that was a bit feral for her mum. I said to her mum, just keep Jess on the horse for another six months and it will be right to go.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cRaquel is 13. I\u2019ve taught her for a couple of years now. Prue started teaching them, then they transferred to me because Prue was having babies and all that sort of thing. Raquel has a really nice Thoroughbred horse \u2013 just one of those very trainable ones. Raquel is in the mould of Sammi McLeod, Kristy Oatley-Nist! At 12-13, she is riding flying changes and half pass. She has just come 7th<\/sup> at her first 3DE \u2013 in Pre-Novice at Sydney, the best placed young rider in that class.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cToday is just a normal flatwork lesson. Just basic dressage with Jess\u2019 horse, just round even rhythm \u2013 no rocket science. Just establishing an even rhythm in the trot and canter \u2013 he\u2019s a Thoroughbred who wants to go, a bit difficult in his frame. He\u2019s a bit naturally upside down, doesn\u2019t like being round. We just work on that. Jess has done a super job, six months ago you couldn\u2019t get him round. He\u2019s a real tough character, you try to make him do something and he just says \u2018no, I don\u2019t like that!\u2019 So she has just chipped away at him, and done a nice subtle job. He\u2019s now round with a nice trot and nice canter, it\u2019s a little bit free but for the stage he is at, it is perfect.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWith Raquel, you\u2019ve just got to try and remember she is only 13. She does flying changes, she rides through all the exercises I have advanced riders doing at Squad Schools. She is just an amazing talent and there is no reason her horse can\u2019t go Advanced. Her mum has heart failure when I tell her that, but Raquel is one of those lucky ones who have a super horse at that age \u2013 a bit of a Wendy Schaeffer situation. They get the horse when they are young and go all through the grades with it, by the time they get to Advanced level, they have done it so slowly that they never ever frighten the horse. At every point they are champing at the bit to get to the next level \u2013 she is not old enough to go Novice, but she trains over all the Novice jumps at Lochinvar. By the time she is old enough to move to Novice she\u2019ll be well and truly ready for it, same when she goes Intermediate, they will be indestructible by the time they get to Advanced.\u201d<\/p>\n

After the lesson:<\/p>\n

What were you trying to do today?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cWith Jess\u2019 horse, he\u2019s younger and we were just trying to do relentless rhythm, rhythm \u2013 we almost try to bore him a little because he doesn\u2019t cope with being told what to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

Is that a racehorse thing?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cAbsolutely. I think you\u2019ve got to let them relax, the good riders can do it quicker, but Jess is doing a really really good job of letting him relax with not a lot of pressure. Still making him do the things we want him to do. He did a little counter canter there today, he did the short side in counter canter, and had good balance. The canter itself was shorter than it has been, so she is making a real improvement without a lot of pressure. That\u2019s all we can expect from him.\u201d<\/p>\n

And the other horse is pretty flash?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cThe other horse is really really fancy and Raquel does a fantastic job. Yes, the horse is not perfect on the bit, it doesn\u2019t have the perfect bend in the shoulder in and half pass but the fact that I can say to her, shoulder in or half pass, and she understands about the inside leg and the outside leg \u2013 and the inside leg and the outside rein. She understands riding a flying change\u2026 that blows me away for 13, if I\u2019d had that sort of training when I was 13\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI just keep Raquel chipping through all those movements so that by the time she gets to Advanced, they\u2019ll be like riding walk, trot and canter. We\u2019ll definitely want the horse to be a little softer, a little rounder. He was a bit tight off the aids today, jumped off the leg like a little Thoroughbred would, but really with Raquel it\u2019s making her feel that she can compete with the best of them. The medium trot just gets bigger and bigger, the horse is really elastic, really powerful, has lovely expression in the changes. It is just a matter of keeping Raquel confident, confident she can take on the really good guys.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not about teaching them to ride, it is more about showing them the path that they have to take to get where they want to go. Yeah I\u2019ll teach them to ride as we go along, but the hardest part is picking them up when they fall off, or have a stop. Raquel went to Jump Club a couple of weeks before she went to Sydney, and the course builder racked up the metre five class to a metre fifteen, and she had a couple of stops and was eliminated. We had to fix that. We fixed that, and when we went to Sydney, she had a good round in the showjumping.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s those sort of things that you need to get onto quickly before they are a problem. Those kids can ride \u2013 gee they can ride. They have a good natural feel and it is just about educating them, what their legs do, what their hands do, just showing them the way, and giving them good information when they need good information.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhich events to go to, which events not to go to. People can get burned because they go to the wrong event, because the course is too hard. As an experienced rider, they come to me for that sort of advice. When should I jump from Prelim to Pre-Novice? I\u2019ll control all those things until they go Advanced, and sometimes you tell them they should go Advanced when they don\u2019t feel they should go Advanced, but they look ready, and you tell them they are doing everything the right way and give them confidence to go and do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOther times you have to hold them back\u2026 that\u2019s just your job as coach, keeping them heading on the right track. Confidence is the biggest thing for the rider, the horse is there, it will do it if we train it well enough.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the major jobs of the coach is to pick up the rider and keep them going. I think that\u2019s something we got from Heath Ryan when we trained with him at the Centre \u2013 he picked us up and took us where he\u2019d been and where he was going. You feel that\u2019s what you want to do for the kids you teach. You want to take them with you\u2026 If I can help get them to where they want to go, that\u2019s great.\u201d<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared in the May 2007 issue of The Horse Magazine<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is the final instalment in our series with Eventing riders and trainers, Prue and Craig Barrett…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":19372,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[528,73,979],"class_list":["post-19371","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-eventing","tag-craig-barrett","tag-eventing-training","tag-prue-barrett"],"acf":[],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19371","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19371"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19371\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20684,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19371\/revisions\/20684"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19372"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19371"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19371"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19371"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}