team Davison – H&H visits the talented family at home
With husband-and-wife dressage duo Richard and Gill Davison both riding at the top level and their sons competing in showjumping, Stephanie Bateman looks around the family’s multi-discipline yard in Staffordshire
THE Davisons’ yard is exactly how you’d imagine it — pristinely tidy, lavish yet practical, and notably calm and quiet.
A former dairy farm dating back to 1790, the beautiful red-brick buildings ooze character and charm and have been lovingly and thoughtfully restored into the equestrian jewel the property is today.
Nestled in the Staffordshire countryside, Combridge Farm is home to dressage riders Gill and Richard, their two international showjumping sons Tom and Joe — as well as Sweep the Border collie and Richard’s flock of sheep.
The dressage supremos took on the farm 32 years ago after buying it from “a farmer who had put in some stables and a grass gallops to train his racehorses, but not much else”. “The ceiling in the kitchen collapsed and the whole house was a bit run-down, but we just about managed to live in it while we did it up,” says Gill.
THE indoor arena, where I find Gill and Richard performing slick grand prix movements in preparation for Hartpury CDI, is plush. Plaques and medals from various championships and Olympics are suspended from the viewing gallery walls that overlook the arena, reminding me this is the home of a four-time Olympian and multi medal-winning dressage champion.
Aside from the mirrors, light-flooded windows, and an indoor sound system, there is also a cosy viewing room with ornate gas fire, kitchenette, dining table and lounge incorporated into the building.
“We deliberately had different surfaces put down in the indoor and outdoor arenas,” explains Richard as he schools his rising star Bubblingh. “The indoor has a waxed Martin Collins surface to keep the dust levels down, whereas the outdoor has an Andrews Bowen surface that is only lightly waxed to allow the jumper’s hooves to slide after landing from a fence.
“We train the dressage horses both indoors and outdoors to give them variety, and there’s a grass arena for jumping, which has a slight slope and undulation that’s good for the horses’ conditioning and soundness.”
Leading straight from the outdoor arena is an all-weather gallop of roughly 800m which continues into a grass gallops, totalling 1km.
“It goes uphill and around corners, which assists with adaptability and improves the
horses’ balance,” adds Richard.
The farm is set in around 20 acres, some of which is sectioned off into individual paddocks that the horses are turned out into every day throughout the year.
“Most of the horses live out during the summer and come in during the day,” explains Richard. “We take paddock maintenance very seriously, so we poo-pick every day to prevent patches of sour grass and reduce worms, and we fertilise them twice a year with Suregrow in early spring and again in late summer.”
The paddocks are co-grazed by Richard’s sheep, which roam freely underneath the Horserail electric fencing. In order to herd the sheep, Richard has employed the services of his two-year-old Border collie Sweep, whom he trained himself.
“My father kept sheep and we’ve always had sheepdogs,” says Richard. “Sweep has a lovely nature and is a good worker, but she has an annoying habit of secretly taking a single glove or spur and burying them.”
THE yard is set up purely for the use of the Davisons — there are no liveries, and Richard only mentors a select few riders. There’s a mixture of horses ranging from Gill and Richard’s dressage horses to
Tom and Joe’s jumpers, which include experienced four-star horses and an assortment of youngsters.
The family employs two full-time and two part-time grooms, a travelling groom and their secretary Christine Dyche, who has her own office next to the house.
Aside from the original stable block opposite the farmhouse, an adjacent barn houses the lorries, feed room and a saltwater ECB equine spa.
“Horses that have just jumped or performed high-intensity work are put on the spa and stand in cold, oxygenated water at knee height for 20 minutes, similar to Andy Murray’s ice baths,” explains Joe, the Davisons’ younger son.
Joe produces and competes showjumpers from the yard and lives in an apartment on site, whereas older son Tom spends his time between the USA and Europe doing a mixture of riding, training and producing showjumpers.
“The boys have slightly different roles and the family dynamics are evolving all the time,” says Richard. “Gill thinks I had a master plan to encourage the boys into an equestrian career, but that is not the case. Tom went to Manchester University to study business and Joe did equine science at Reaseheath College. There are advantages and disadvantages of children following in their parents’ footsteps. I think it’s about finding your cog in the wheel and they’ve done that.” Both Gill and Richard evented back in the day, so their equestrian experience isn’t simply limited to inside the white boards. It’s clear that the mix of disciplines works very well.
“It’s a bit of a cliché, but we’re all interested in developing the top equine athlete and we enjoy the journey,” says Richard. “We ride each other’s horses, which works well because we all focus on slightly different things.”
After a training session with Richard on her European hopeful Alfranco, Gill gets on board one of the recently backed four-yearold jumpers and jumps him in the outdoor. Richard and Joe soon join her on two other young jumpers while Tom adjusts the fences and comments on suitable exercises. It’s fascinating seeing Richard and Gill riding in jumping saddles and hearing them ask
Joe and Tom for advice.
“I lead on the dressage horses and the rideability of the jumpers, but everything else we do together,” Richard says. “We are all experienced riders, so everybody feeds back to everybody and we work out the next step together.”
For Gill, riding the young horses makes a nice change.
‘We ride each other’s horses, which works well because we all focus on slightly different things’