{"id":33,"date":"2020-12-11T09:24:40","date_gmt":"2020-12-10T22:24:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/69.89.31.130\/~thehors5\/thm\/?p=33"},"modified":"2020-12-15T12:29:58","modified_gmt":"2020-12-15T01:29:58","slug":"miguel-tavora-%e2%80%93-thinking-horseman-%e2%80%93-part-1-%e2%80%93-the-young-horse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/2020\/12\/miguel-tavora-%e2%80%93-thinking-horseman-%e2%80%93-part-1-%e2%80%93-the-young-horse\/","title":{"rendered":"Miguel Tavora \u2013 Thinking Horseman \u2013 Part 1 \u2013 The Young Horse"},"content":{"rendered":"

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It is three years since my dear friend Miguel Tavora died after a courageous battle with cancer. Right to the end he maintained the dignity, the humour and the warmth that marked my long association with him. I will publish this series of five articles that first appeared some ten years ago, in a tribute to his memory and to remind us all how much we lost when he left us. Scarcely a day goes by when I don’t think, I’d like to talk about that with Miguel…<\/h2>\n

We are lucky, not long before he died, Miguel finished his book, published first in Portuguese, then in English. His insights will live for as long as there are horsemen and women who realise that reading can be the key to riding. CH<\/h2>\n

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The book is available from the publisher, Xenophon Press<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Miguel Tavora is a Thinking Horseman, a curiously old fashioned appellation for what, one suspects, is a heavily endangered species. Miguel doesn\u2019t routinely mouth platitudes about the Great Masters of Dressage \u2013 he actually reads, and re-reads, them\u2026 in English and, if necessary, in French. Not forgetting his study of the equestrian works of his countrymen in Portuguese, or the writings of their near neighbours, the Spanish.<\/p>\n

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Does it affect his teaching and training? \u2028Yes, that learning provides a vastly richer variety of responses, exercises and solutions. I remember the best thing about training with Miguel was the way you went away from even a single 45-minute session, with a whole new bag of exercises and figures to ride. Not sure the half-halts are getting through? Try riding a trot shoulder-in along the long side, make a walk transition without losing the position of the shoulder-in? Find that too easy? Try renvers in left canter (on the right rein) along the wall, leave the wall on a diagonal and start the pirouette to the left. During this pirouette make a transition to the walk keeping the horse on the same pirouette.<\/p>\n

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I think Miguel was both blessed and cursed through his association with the great Portuguese \u00e9cuyer, Nuno Oliveira. Poor Nuno, especially after his death in a Western Australian motel in 1989, became the champion of that group of riders who are too sensitive and artistic to ride at competitions, who spend their time mincing around the school at home, usually tricked up in a double bridle with the poor horse hollow in the back and flicking its legs. “Wow look at the Passage!” Pissage<\/em> more like.<\/p>\n

It was a travesty of Nuno\u2019s life and work \u2013 he was a trainer who prided himself on producing horses athletic enough to get out of the way of the horns of a charging bull \u2013 and while he is enlisted in an obsessive lovely light French versus heavy hard German fantasy, this ignores the fact, that the first and foremost text at Nuno\u2019s side was the founding text of the modern German School, Gymnasium of the Horse<\/em> by Gustav Steinbrecht.<\/p>\n

When he arrived in Australia in 1982 Miguel got lumped in the too superior to compete army, although he soon set about confounding those expectations. At a time when none of the Australian horses could passage (we are talking early 80\u2019s here!) he produced Wendy Johnston and the Thoroughbred stallion Runs on Love, and for the first time Aussies could see what a passage should look like.<\/p>\n

To hammer home the point, in the 1990\u2019s he produced Australian Grand Prix Champions, Dawn Mitchell and Ballykisteen Sedaka (and yes, like ROL, another Thoroughbred), followed by another classy Grand Prix Thoroughbred for Dawn, Exposay.<\/p>\n

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George Morris and Miguel share their philosophies on training and teaching on one of Miguel’s visits to the US<\/em><\/p>\n

Of late, Miguel has been finding a ready audience for his teaching in the United States, and has spent much of his teaching time there, but now, with a new property at Kurmond, he is looking to spend more time in Australia.<\/p>\n

He is shocked when I confess that I have stopped riding, saying that to stop riding would be for him, like stopping living \u2013 his obsession with the horse has been lifelong\u2026<\/p>\n

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Major D. Miguel de Lancastre e Tavora (Abrantes) 1943 – 2017<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I was a child on the right hand side of our house where I was born, there was a stable and a man had a horse and a cart to carry furniture around the town of Lisbon. That was the first horse I saw, and since then, I thought horses were what I wanted to do\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMy father and my father\u2019s family were old fashioned, so of course they had horses. My grandfather was in love with carriages and driving, and he spent a lot of money buying Lipizzaners to pull the carriage \u2013 this was in the nineteenth century. My father was not really a horseman, even though he fought in the first world war in the Belgian Cavalry, but he was never a very enthusiastic or good rider.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of my uncles Rodrigo de Castro Pereira was one of the first top showjumpers in all the world, at the end of the nineteenth century, beginning of the twentieth. He was the one who started Nuno Oliveira \u2013 Nuno used to work on his arena, he was one of the first to promote Nuno Oliveira. He took me to Nuno to ride when I was eight years old.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u201cI rode with Nuno Oliveira for ten years, until I went to the Military Academy when I was eighteen. In the \u00a0Army I did much more eventing and showjumping \u2013 and we were at war in Africa so I didn\u2019t have very much time. After the war I went to the School in Maffra, which is a military riding academy, like Saumur in France, in fact it was established by officers from Saumur. Colonel Saint Andre who was very famous in France, came to Portugal and lived there a long time, and he formed the school in Maffra \u2013 which trained not only military but also civilian riders.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u201cIt was a very good experience because having the basic classical training of Nuno Oliveira and the demanding competitive training in Maffra, helped my career. I competed a lot in showjumping and eventing. I competed a lot in dressage too. I learnt that the classical academic principles should be followed absolutely correctly, in the right time, in the right place, and they are not just a fantasy, they are real.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u201cIn the competition, you can\u2019t say, \u2018oh he\u2019s not right today, I\u2019ll do it tomorrow\u2019. \u00a0You\u2019ve got to be able to produce at that moment \u2013 and that gave me a discipline that with Nuno we never really had. Nuno was more of an artist, a perfectionist but not oriented to competitive riding. To him riding was just an art, and sometimes it was lacking not the discipline of training but the discipline of actually putting together a competitive dressage test.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u201cIn Maffra, I learnt that from very good instructors in showjumping and eventing. I ended up staying at Maffra as an instructor, and became the \u00c9cuyer en Chef, just before I retired. And through that period I was always in contact with Nuno Oliveira, he was my advisor and friend.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIf I had a problem with a horse I would go to him and ask for his help. He helped me a lot. He started his career training horses to compete, mostly he trained showjumpers \u2013 he would train the flatwork to prepare them to jump. He even competed in showjumping when he was young.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI decided to retire, I asked Nuno Oliveira to find me a place and he found me a place here in Australia.\u201d<\/p>\n

Miguel likes to start his horses himself, but he has reached that stage in life, where he prefers to let his neighbour, Matthew Bates actually sit the first few rides \u2013 but it should be noted, the horse has been well taught with the lunge line before that\u2026<\/p>\n

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\u201cRather than talking about breaking in, I would rather talk about familiarisation, or first stages of training. I assume that the horse has been well handled already, that\u2019s very important, and well handled just means well handled, not confusing the horse by playing with him like a dog, and with too many treats \u2013 just teach the horse to go from A to B, to be lead from one side to the other, to pick up the feet.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen he comes to the arena the first task is to teach him to lunge. It is on the lunge that he starts working on balance and impulsion \u2013 similar to the work he is going to have when he is ridden. He must start to develop his muscles and supple up his joints and his body, to prepare him to be ridden. This is the physical basis of the work on the lunge. At the same time, on the mental level, we are starting to teach some communication skills \u2013 whip to go forward, the lunge line to slow down and make the circle smaller or bigger, to begin to having some control, starting to develop the language of the aids.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe start to establish that language of the aids by making use of the principle of association, so that when I put the rider on the horse\u2019s back later on, he associates what he knows on the lunge with the aids that the rider gives when he is on the horse. He begins little by little going not from my aids, but from the aids of the rider. If he doesn\u2019t go for the rider, I go again with my aids from the ground.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMost important of all is the gymnastic point of view because by working on that outline, the balance that he uses must be different from the balance he uses when he is out by himself in the paddock. With the rider on his back he needs to engage the hindquarters, needs to flex his poll, he needs to come round, and like that he goes in a way that is balanced.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u201cWith the work on the lunge, the horse starts always with a good movement forward, he starts developing the muscles to be comfortable to be going in this way later on when he is ridden.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThen comes the rider \u2013 and at first this is very difficult work for the rider. He has to be very well balanced, be able to accompany all the movements of the horse, because what I want him to do at this stage is just connect himself with the movement and do nothing \u2013 in order that the horse can get used to that strange weight on his back, and find how to organise his body to go under that weight. We are still lunging him with the side reins very long, just to keep the horse in the correct outline.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u201cIn the first phase, Matt, my helper, just stays on the horse very quiet, and he doesn\u2019t do anything. He knows that I will control the horse, and stop the horse if it tries to do something stupid. Of course if the horse gets out of my control, then Matt will help himself for sure.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Just a week or two before we visited, something startled Felix (by Falsterbo) \u2013 and before he knew it, Miguel was on the floor of the arena. Matt rushed to his side. “Are you alright?” “I am, only my pride is hurt.” That afternoon, Matt was riding yet another youngster, and he too hit the deck. “Are you okay”, “Yes, I am, but my pride is with yours\u2026”<\/p>\n

\u201cThe second phase we start with the association process. I say, ‘Matt push’, and he touches with the legs, and at the same time, I push with the whip. The horse knows the whip, but he didn\u2019t know the legs \u2013 but because he knows the whip, he learns legs and whip. And I do that many times until I say, ‘Matt push’, and the horse goes from the legs without waiting for the whip.\u201d<\/p>\n

But it is from very light leg that he responds?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cExactly, and if any time the horse doesn\u2019t respond to the legs, I don\u2019t increase the strength of the legs \u2013 I use the whip again. I reinforce, I go back to the basics, because if the horse doesn\u2019t go from the light leg, then he doesn\u2019t understand. Little by little, the horse will go from the legs and not from the whip. In this time it is very difficult because the rider can\u2019t touch on the bridle, he must not touch on the mouth. The horse must go forward and I say \u2018whoa\u2019 and go forward, push again, just teaching the legs.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThen when I say, “Matt walk\u2019 or \u2018Slow down the trot a bit\u2019 and Matt sits a bit and takes and gives without legs, at the same time I go \u2018whoa, whoa, whoa\u2019, and with the lunge line I make the horse slow down, and he comes to a shorter trot or a walk or whatever. The horse starts to associate Matt\u2019s hands with my aids, and very soon I don\u2019t need to use my aids, and the horse is listening to the rider. Again, any time the horse doesn\u2019t respond, Matt is not going to start pulling on the reins \u2013 it is always take and give, and if the horse doesn\u2019t respond, then I provide the reinforcement from the ground.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe next step is to make the circle smaller, and I say, Matt open the inside rein, and as he opens the inside rein, I shorten the lunge \u2013 and he begins associating inside rein and opening rein \u2013 and he knows the lunge, he starts to understand, open the inside rein means make the circle smaller.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI walk in front of the horse, and say, \u2018Matt open the left hand rein\u2019 and the horse goes to the left, open the right and the horse goes to the right. It starts with the horse going from the cavesson and the lunge, but eventually he goes not from me, now he knows legs, he knows hands, it is time for Matt to ride him and for him to go free.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI still stay on the ground, and normally I have another helper down the other end of the arena, the horse is still working on the circle, I still help him from the ground with the whip. He still remembers the lunge, and he is very controllable \u2013 then he starts going more from Matt. Little by little I withdraw, and Matt takes more control.\u00a0Any time the horse doesn\u2019t respond, if he doesn\u2019t respond to the legs, then Matt doesn\u2019t increase the legs, I go with the whip, so the horse stays light to the legs.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u201cThe second part is to teach the horse to go from the rider\u2019s whip \u2013 and Matt starts carrying the whip, he touches with the whip, I reinforce with my whip. After he associates Matt\u2019s whip with my whip, then he goes from Matt\u2019s whip.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u201cNext with the spurs. Matt asks with the spurs, I ask with my whip on the ground, because sometimes with the spurs the horse will curl up instead of going forward. Spur and whip, spur and whip, then the horse knows it that the spur is to reinforce the leg, and to go forward. Everything is very simple. Circles, then go large, circle, go large\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u201cAt the same time I am starting a little bit of mobilisation in hand, turn around the inside leg \u2013 then the horse starts to learn to go from the inside leg, and that is what breaking in is. Everything is very simple, very confident, the horse knows the aids, knows the balance, he knows his ABC, and we start to ride the horse, he is ready to do the exercises that he needs to continue developing his body, making himself strong, and obedient.\u201d<\/p>\n

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When do we start to take a contact?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cThe horse already has contact with the side reins, and he accepts the side reins. Once he starts to go from the legs forward, and the rider starts opening the inside rein, the horse by himself is in contact, we don\u2019t think about it \u2013 it happens, he is there. Without thinking he passes from the side reins to the reins, and when I say \u2018Matt, slow down the trot\u2019, Matt takes and gives, takes and gives, and with my cavesson and lunge I slow the horse down. The horse begins to accept that hands are to slow down, to take contact, and little by little without Matt having to think about it, the horse accepts the contact by himself.\u201d<\/p>\n

When do we switch from the horse accepting the opening rein, to the horse accepting the outside rein?<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cThat is much later on. When I start working with a bit of the shoulder-in on the circle, we ride the shoulder fore, and then the outside rein happens. If I keep my outside rein, and very quietly open the inside rein so the horse bends, then he accepts the contact. It happens, I never tell him go to the outside rein. Open the rein, make the circle smaller, bend him a bit more, the horse bends a bit more, stretch, and he begins to accept the outside rein. Never go to the outside rein, because if he goes to the outside rein, he shortens up and jams the neck.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u201cAids are the way we communicate with our horse. They are not instinctive, they have to be taught to the horse. We start in the first phase of the training on the lunge, and after we sophisticate and combine the aids. The most important thing of all is that I have two basic aids: my legs and my hands. My seat and my back are going to make my legs and my hands more effective. What my seat does is make my legs act on the right time and the right place. My back helps my hands work at the right time, in the right place.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the past, they used to call these \u2018weight aids\u2019, that by putting the weight to one side or the other, the rider would help the horse. I don\u2019t think that is quite true. What is very important, for example, in a half pass to the right, is not for me to put my weight on the inside stirrup, because if I put more weight on the inside, I am going to make the horse unbalanced. What is more important is not to let myself put the weight on the outside stirrup.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes when we say put the weight on the inside, it is not really to put the weight on the inside, it is NOT to put the weight to the outside. The rider has to try to be in the middle of the horse. Of course you might have a horse that is resisting going to the right in half pass \u2013 then I might lean a bit more to the right, and help the horse to go more to the right. But on the other hand the horse can then start running to the right, rushing to the right, because he loses the balance because of my body. Better to ask, why is the horse not going to the right? Because it is not bent, not engaged? Solve that problem and try to keep your weight in the middle instead of finding a trick and putting the weight more on the inside.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u201cRight from the beginning of the training we have to teach the horse to go by himself. He has to learn to go in self-carriage. I tell him to do something, and the horse starts doing what I asked, and I stop telling him what to do. It\u2019s like teaching the horse to bend to the right, if I ask him to bend to the right, and he does it, and I keep asking him to bend to the right, then he doesn\u2019t understand \u2013 then he becomes numb or he starts resisting to get away from the aids. The aids have to cease when they are obeyed. That is the most important principle of all \u2013 we don\u2019t support the horse.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\u201cWhen I am riding this three-year-old horse, I am mixing rising and sitting trot but I stay very light in the saddle. I occasionally ask my wife, Di, to push with the long whip from the ground. At this stage, I am still working legs without hands, hands without legs. First he has to understand this, then we put it together. I don\u2019t give a damn about having him round at this stage, just going forward because I know that when he goes forward and responds to my legs I can immediately make him round by the bend [on the circle], by transitions and ultimately by the half halt. If he is not responding to my legs, then Di comes with the whip, and I will end up with a horse that is light to my legs, light to my hands.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNow I can ask a little shoulder-in on the circle. This is the first and last lesson of de la Gu\u00e9rini\u00e8re. With a young horse like this in the first year of his riding, this is serious, we are not playing, it is very serious, but we are considerate, he is a young horse, he is immature \u2013 he\u2019s ours, so we don\u2019t need to hurry.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNow I am concentrating on transitions with him. He is sensitive \u00a0but not stupid. Usually with a horse this age, they are clumsy, losing balance, drifting in and out in the canter \u2013 he has never had this problem. He has always been balanced and strong on his feet. He can stretch down with good movement and he is never on his forehand \u2013 but if he curls back, then I need to do something to correct it.\u201d<\/p>\n

“The \u00a0first balance we are working is horizontal (round and more, or less, down). When he flexes the poll, the nuchal ligament stretches and I can make him engage the hind legs. Sometimes I have to ride the horse right down. I will put him in whatever position I need to feel his back come up. The back is the bridge and connection between the forehand and the hindquarters, this bridge must be strong and supple in order to always have a good connection. It is through this connection that my horse will be able to respond to my half halt and become durchlassigkeit<\/em>, which is the quality in the horse that permits the aids to pass through his body and achieve lightness – which is the horse obeying to the slightest aid of the rider.<\/p>\n

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Click this link for\u00a0Part Two with Miguel Tavora\u00a0<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The master horseman Miguel Tavora died just on three years ago. This series of articles highlights his teaching – teaching that sought to combine the best of the world’s classical traditions…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19221,"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":[4],"tags":[9,8,10],"class_list":["post-33","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dressage","tag-master-portuguese-equitation","tag-miguel-tavora","tag-young-dressage-horse"],"acf":[],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33","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\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":56694,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33\/revisions\/56694"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19221"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.horsemagazine.com\/thm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}