Our columnist sees fantastic horsemanship at work—and wants a better system for highlighting it.
I was reminded just how exciting hunters still are while judging at the FTI Winter Equestrian Festival (Fla.). I got to judge most of the professional hunter sections, and I saw some amazing rounds with very big scores, including Holly Orlando in the regular conformation, Liza Boyd in the high performance hunters, and Louise Serio, Erynn Ballard and Patricia Griffith in various sections of the pre-green hunters.
In order to win, these riders had to have nice horses—attractive, nice movers and very good jumpers. All the riders delivered great rounds with good and consistent distances at all of the jumps. I’d like to talk about what set these rounds apart as the winners—and what is still so exciting about the hunter sport.
The Desire To Jump: The most important piece of any hunter round is the jump itself. In each and every one of the rounds I am talking about here the riders worked with their horses to get them to make beautiful efforts at each and every jump. The horses jumped high, straight and in the middle of each fence. They made a big effort because they could and because they wanted to, not because they were being forced to do it. There was nowhere on course where you felt that the rider was doing the work for the horse, lifting him over the fences, or making him make an effort. These riders instilled in their horses the desire to make the great jump.
Pace: The next piece all these winning rounds had in common was pace. I’m not talking about galloping madly around the ring but working in a nice hand gallop, allowing the jumps to come up effortlessly and out of stride. These riders showed brilliance as well as a bit of daring, or risk taking. So often these days we see horses and riders walking around the course and crawling through the turns. Although these riders often arrive at the right distance, the mechanical way they have produced this distance takes away significantly from the round itself. The first question should be whether or not a horse and rider can gallop and jump. Without a doubt, the riders in these rounds answered that question in the positive.
Expression: Another major factor I consider when judging hunters is the expression of the horse. It’s critical that the horse not only produce a good round and great jumps, but he must also be enjoying it. The horse that has some brilliance and his ears and expression always looking ahead should ultimately be the winner. In the same vein, a horse that feels good about making a great effort at a jump and expresses himself by playing a bit on the landing side should be rewarded, not punished.
ADVERTISEMENT
Everything Else: These horse-and-rider combinations that won the WEF classes delivered all of the above. What was interesting to me, though, was everything else that they incorporated into their rounds—the pieces that made them the winners. All of these horses and riders were turned out impeccably. The horses had beautiful coats and were perfectly braided. All the riders had well fitting, traditional hunt coats and beautiful, shiny boots. All the riders rode with great positions, centered perfectly on their horses, and were very still. They used invisible aids to produce beautiful, effortless rounds without drawing any attention to themselves; instead they kept your attention on their horses. These riders kept track of every single step. They had beautiful entrances, smooth transitions, even, brilliant pace with great jumps and a perfect finishing circle. They knew they were being judged from the moment they entered the ring until the moment they left, and they showed their horses to the best of their ability for that entire time. This, for me and my fellow judges, was exciting. It’s also very important to our sport and where we’re going.
Time Is Not On Our Side
It seems that the greatest enemy of the hunters now is time. We have beautiful jumps, lovely rings and fantastic footing. The courses are becoming better and more interesting. But there’s almost no one around to enjoy the excitement.
With so many classes and so many rings, most everyone is rushing around with way too much to do to be able to see, much less savor or study, these rounds. We need to focus on creating more events that are either exciting stand-alone events or at least try to create special classes that are scheduled when more people can see them.
Time is the enemy to the hunters in another sense. The only way to develop the skills that the riders I’m using as examples have is to spend time studying the sport. This does not mean just showing as many horses as possible as often as possible but actually taking the time to study the sport and learn the skills necessary to do it well. Most of this has to happen between shows at home and with a huge investment of time and effort. This is the same no matter what level of rider you are—professional, junior, amateur or pony rider. It takes time to develop as a rider and to master the skills that produce exciting rounds.
Great hunter rounds are still very exciting, and they’re also important to the American system of riding. As the sport’s leaders, we need to continue to create the proper venues to showcase the hunters. We need to continue to push for better and more interesting courses and jump construction that reward great jumpers and great riding. We need to push to come up with events that place top hunter riding in front of the public and ourselves when and where it can be studied and enjoyed.
ADVERTISEMENT
We should think a bit out of the box and see if we can’t continue to create new sections that reach out to the highest level of riders and horses. The derbies have begun to answer these questions, but I believe we can do more. We have very thoughtfully taken care of the entry level of our sport with all our various sections, and now we need to focus on the top end. I think we could come up with new sections with more demanding courses, higher jumps and new and different rider problems. This would be good for generating interest in the sport and would also promote and encourage better riding in America, based in the hunter division, where it’s always started. We need to work on stretching our better horses and riders within the hunter sport.
On the most basic level, however, in order to protect the excitement that is great hunter sport, we need to do a better job of promoting excellence. Excellence makes any discipline exciting, and the culmination of perfectly executed details in a great hunter round is no exception.
We need to get away from the idea of over “prepared,” over medicated, mechanical and listless hunter rounds. True hunter sport is about much more than fat, shiny horses with fake tails walking around the ring and stepping over the fences with no expression, sore bodies, no athletic ability and no obvious mistakes. We need to get back to producing good riders on fresh, sound horses that are properly trained to do their job with some enthusiasm and joy. This requires time and effort on the part of all of us, riders and trainers alike. But this time is not only necessary; it’s a very important investment in our future.
Geoff Teall, of Wellington, Fla., trains in the hunter, jumper and equitation divisions—with an emphasis on amateur and junior riders—and shows in the professional hunter divisions. An R-rated U.S. Equestrian Federation judge, he has presided over the Pessoa/USEF Medal Finals, USEF Pony Finals, USEF Pony Medal Finals and prestigious shows such as the Washington International (D.C.) and National Horse Show. Teall also serves on the USEF’s National Hunter Committee and chairs the U.S. Hunter Jumper Association Working Group WCHR Task Force.
