Gwendolen Fer We speak to the French event rider and winner of Pau CCI4*
France’s first female championship eventer for two decades tells Martha Terry about competing with the boys, her top horses — and her sweet tooth
FRANCE’S top female rider is tucking into a pastry, thick with crème pâtissière, as we chat in the secretary’s tent at an event in the Loire valley.
“I am seriously greedy,” Pau CCI4* winner Gwendolen Fer admits. “I adore anything sweet — pastries, custard, milles feuilles, sweets too. I think people get a bit worried when they see how much I eat — especially my boyfriend.”
Despite her calorific excess, the 31-year-old is slim and athletic — testament to her work ethic. At her base near Toulouse, where there are 45 horses, she rides eight a day, alongside teaching around 15 students, plus she’s involved in a programme enabling schoolchildren to combine high-level sports education with their studies. She hasn’t had time for a holiday since setting up her yard in 2009.
“You’d think it would be difficult to find time to eat with how busy I am, but I find the time!” she says. “Luckily, I do so much sport that I don’t really need to diet, though I do yoyo a bit — but it’s easier to be controlled at home. With just one horse competing at an event, there’s so much spare time, and I spend it eating.”
GWENDOLEN’S jokey attitude belies a seriously competitive spirit. At the Blair Europeans in 2005, with Romantic Love, she was the first female rider since Marie-Christine Duroy in 1998 to feature on the French eventing squad, and sixth place at Saumur CCI3* on the up-andcoming Traumprinz secured her “a surprise” team berth for the 2017 Europeans. Although Gwendolen’s fortunes nosedived — literally — along with those of most of the French squad in Strzegom, her win at Pau last month has cemented her status among the best crop of eventers that France has produced this century. Despite the age gap of three decades, there is a bond between the two French ladies.
“I see Marie at events as she’s a judge, and we get on well,” says Gwendolen. “She’s always encouraging me with a positive word. She’s obviously one of the people who has inspired me, as an example for French female riders. I work hard to try and reach her level, or at least a little bit of what she’s achieved.”
At Pau, she surpassed that goal, making history to become France’s first female winner at the highest level. This dearth of female championship riders is more conspicuous in France than any other top equestrian nation. Though Gwendolen is asked her opinion on this ad infinitum, she answers patiently.
“I’m always asked why there are no women — I don’t know,” she says. “In showjumping, it’s the same. It’s a mystery why, in a sport that has generally a much higher female representation than male, it’s the opposite at top level. At lower levels, there are loads of women; at twostar, there are plenty, then at top level very few. I can’t explain why women aren’t making the step up to three- and four-star. Are women perhaps putting up their own barrier in believing there’s no place for them at the top?”
Gwendolen herself has no shadow of tomboy in a man’s world. Her dark hair, which was
neatly tucked into a bun and net with white scrunchie for her earlier dressage test, falls to her waist, and the light piping on her dressage tails synchronises with her hair-do. Her constant companion, Marcel the Staffie, wears a pink and blue Argentinean collar, bought at Badminton. She was in floods of joyful tears after her Pau victory. There’s certainly no attempt to cultivate a macho image.
“For eventing, most riders need to run a business alongside, and perhaps that’s more difficult for women,” she muses. “Yes, women sometimes need to take time off to be mothers, but I don’t think that explains it, as there are still lots of women at two-star. Maybe most owners have less confidence in women — indeed all my owners apart from my brother are female. I don’t know… but anyway, we can be just as good!
“For me, to be the only woman — well, I feel I’ve earned my place,” she adds. “The guys are all encouraging and we get on great.”
PART of the reason that Gwendolen looks set to stay in the mix-up for France is thanks to having two rides, in Traumprinz and Romantic Love, capable of big results at the highest level. Besides Pau, Romantic has won two CIC3*s, plus finished third at Bramham and fourth at Blair CCI3*s; while his younger stablemate has already won at CIC3*. Not only that, but she’s proved she can both produce horses and improve a ready-made one.
She brought on her first horse, Leria Du Ter, from the age of four, taking the mare through young riders to four-star. Due to an accident after Burghley in 2012, she was retired from competition, and has just had her first foal, Hibiki Du Léou — by compatriot Karim Florent Laghouag’s Olympic gold medallist Entebbe De Hus.
“I owe Leria a lot — she was naughty and mareish, complicated in the dressage, but amazing cross-country,” says Gwendolen.
Romantic is another Gwendolen produced from scratch, spotting the Selle Français in the raw when she first saw him as an unbacked two-year-old.
“We actually went to see his sister, but he moved superbly, so we bought him instead,” explains Gwendolen of the 12-year-old by L’Arc De Triomphe out of a thoroughbred mare. “We thought, ‘If he doesn’t jump, we can sell him for dressage’, so we took the risk and he’s turned out to be exceptional.
“‘Roro’ has many strong points: he moves, jumps and gallops. He’s really cheeky though; he mucks about the whole time. If you don’t turn him out, he’ll let himself out. He’s kind but full of character.”
And then there’s the striking black Trakehner, Traumprinz, whom Gwendolen’s owner Isabelle Méranger gave her to ride when he was seven.
“He’s moved rapidly up the levels and has all the right qualities to get to the top,” says Gwendolen of the 10-year-old. “Perhaps he’s a bit trickier mentally than Romantic — he can be sharp — but he’s still a bit green. He’s a model pupil; he just wants to please. I don’t go for really hot horses, though they must be brave and good jumpers.”
We’re likely to see more of her in England too. She’s a regular competitor at Burghley, Badminton, Blair, Blenheim and Bramham, although she wasn’t a fan of this year’s Badminton course — “pas très cheval”.
“But I love going to English events — they are magnificent venues and our owners are thrilled by the scenery,” she says.
The Event Rider Masters could also lure her back to Britain next season. Although her two stars will have their campaign mapped out by the French selectors leading up to the World Games, both of them fit the Masters bill, being strong in the two arena phases.
She admits she’s lacking in successors to these two, though with her current form she may find more experienced rides coming her way, as Traumprinz did.
BESIDES her equine team, Gwendolen has strong human back-up. None of her family rides — she started riding at the local “Poney Club” — but everyone has a role. Her brother Gregory manages her
PR, marketing and sponsors — and owns Romantic; her mother, Marie-France, is in charge of the admin and bookkeeping, while her father, Jean-Noël, oversees the burgeoning building works. Gwen met her sports psychologist boyfriend, Maxime Châtaignier, in a professional capacity — “then it developed further; it was a bit complicated!”
“The mental side is so important in our sport, I think as important as the physical side, once you have the technique,” she says. “Maxime is an ex Olympic speed skater, and he has really helped me with my mental preparation.
“No one in my support network rides, not even for fun — that’s how I like it,” she adds. “Then, when I’m not working or competing, I can have a break. I don’t have to go out for a hack with them!”
Gwendolen has another brother, Cédric, who is politely barred from attending competitions.
“He follows my results from afar because he always brings me bad luck, so I’ve banned him — poor thing!” she laughs.
Gwendolen’s superstitious side is not limited to her luckless brother, however.
“I know they make no difference, but
I have a few superstitions anyway,” she smiles. “I always wear the same belt on cross-country, and fret if I forget it,” she says. “I have one helmet I no longer want to wear because I think it’s unlucky; I’m trying to use it at less important events, but I won’t at a big one.”
They say you make your own luck, though, and Gwendolen has worked her way up to nailing a huge and historic result — powered by Haribo.