I try to watch as many horse people working with horses as my busy life permits. In particular, I am always interested in observing other professionals to see what they do that maybe I could adopt or do better. I’m always on the lookout for good ideas that could make me a better horseman.
Add to that I am regularly asked for my opinion on the horsemanship of other horse people. “What do you think of so and so?” and “Who do you think I should get help from?” or “Isn’t so and so brilliant, what do you think?” are very common questions I get.
Most times I know at least a bit about the people being referred to, sometimes I know a lot but sometimes I am not familiar with the name at all.
Before I talk about the topic I want to discuss, I want to say something about the political correctness of giving an opinion on someone’s horsemanship skills.
Despite being criticized from time to time for giving my honest opinion, I will continue to give my honest opinion. I believe the importance of this is beyond the niceties of the adage “If you can’t say anything nice about somebody, you shouldn’t say anything at all.” I feel that is a nonsense view that does nothing to help horses or the horse owners who ask for my opinion. I am more interested in the welfare of horses than I am in the courtesy of being supportive of people whom I think work in a way that does not benefit horses. Nevertheless, I always try to be polite and respectful and fully explain the reasons behind any appraisal I make.
I have said before on this page that I believe it is the responsibility of professional horse people to openly and politely discuss the methods and philosophy of each other so that the students who are looking for guidance can examine the pros and cons of each trainer or clinician. I don’t believe a polite “no comment” helps anybody – particularly the novice horse owner.
This is why I don’t censor different views and criticisms of my work on this page – as long as the comments are polite and respectful. I might debate people with different opinions on my page, but I don’t censor them. Yet, I keep coming across other professionals who have a strict policy of deleting dissenting comments and banning those who make them.
So having made that clear, what I want to talk about is what I look for when I am weighing up the quality of a person’s horse work. I’m talking about skills or experience. There are plenty of trainers who are very skilled at what they do, but I don’t like what they do. I want to discuss what makes a person a good trainer that I would like to work with.
It is my experience that many people get so caught up in the hoopla of a trainer’s presentation that they don’t see the real quality of the horsemanship behind the smoke and mirrors. Things like clever catch phrases, humorous presentations, a gift of the gab, wow-factor horse tricks, polished videos, a long list of competition ribbons and awards, etc, contribute a great deal to how we perceive a person’s horsemanship. The glitz, the tricks, and the smooth talk are so upfront and attractive, that we often fail to see the emotional state of the horse behind it. It takes a lot of self-discipline to put that stuff aside and focus on how the horse is doing.
The person who can stand on the back of his horse and start a chainsaw attracts a lot more attention than the person who can inspire a nice soft trot from their horse. The person who can be riding an unbroken horse in 2 hrs gets a lot more cheers than the person who has a horse happy to see him when he walks into the paddock. The person who can train a horse to perform high-level movements after 4 months of training attracts a lot more students than the person whose horse will softly lower its head to accept the halter.
It is the nature of people that we are impressed by the glaringly obvious and miss the brilliance of the subtle things.
Now back to what I look for when I am watching another horse person working.
The first criteria that is super important is kindness. A trainer needs to be kind. They need to care more about how a horse feels about the work than the work itself. I think kindness possibly goes to the top of my list.
For example, I look for how the trainer approaches a horse for the first time. I want to know if they adjust their approach and touch for what the horse is feeling to help the horse feel more comfortable. That tells me how much they care about the horse in front of them.
The second thing that is important to me and that speaks volumes about the kind of horse person I am watching is how a person uses driving and directing pressure. When a trainer asks a horse to do something I look to see if they start by trying to direct the horse’s thought or do they immediately begin by driving the horse. If they start by driving the horse, I am almost immediately turned off. I don’t mind if they try to initially direct the horse and then find they have to drive them. But if they begin by driving the horse; it is an immediate loss of 100 points of credit. They would have to be pretty bloody amazing in everything else they do to make up for the crime of going directly to driving horses.
(As an aside for those who don’t know the difference between directing and driving a horse, directing is sending a horse toward where it is thinking, and driving is sending a horse away from where it is thinking. More information is in my book “The Essence Of Good Horsemanship.)
This thing about first directing a horse’s thought is fundamental as to whether a person is the kind of trainer who is only concerned with a horse being mindlessly obedient or whether they are interested in a horse willingly following an idea the trainer presents.
The classic example of this can be seen at clinics and in groundwork videos when a trainer asks a horse to lunge around them in a circle. Trainers who begin by approaching a horse while at the same time spinning the tail end of the lead rope or slapping their leg or waving the coils of a lariat etc are missing the part about working co-operatively with the thoughts of a horse.
However, let me be clear, I am not saying that it is wrong to drive a horse if a horse does not understand how to respond when you try to direct its thought. But starting by driving a horse speaks volumes about whether a person sees a horse as a slave or a friend.
The third important thing that I look for when watching another professional horse person is how much they understand and have thought about why they do what they do. I believe a person needs a clear and rational understanding of the things they want a horse to understand. If the explanation does not stand up to critical scrutiny then I can’t see the point and I question the credentials of the person doing the teaching.
Take for example the exercise of lateral flexion, where a horse is expected to stand still while a rider uses the reins to flex the neck left and right. I have seen this hundreds (maybe thousands) of times and have asked the question “why” nearly as often. I have never received a logical explanation from anybody that made sense to the horses or me. Yet it is an almost universal exercise.
To paraphrase Albert Einstein, “If a person cannot correctly explain a concept in simple language then they do not understand their subject well enough.”
Other aspects of a person’s horse work can influence my view of them, but I consider the four elements I have mentioned form the basis by which I judge the horsemanship of everybody I come across. You may have your own set of criteria that differs from mine, but whatever they are, I urge you to utilize them with everybody you see working a horse.
This was taken at the Tom Dorrence Benefit in 2001 in Forth Worth, Texas. These are the participants that were invited to ride in the event. I met and saw a lot of trainers. Some were there to honour Tom and work horses and some seemed to be there for different reasons.