Life lessons Does being broken in at an older age affect what you can do with your horse?
Horses are usually backed before they turn four, so what happens when this tradition is broken and a horse finds himself under the saddle for the first time in his teens? Julie Harding finds out
YOU COULD SIT on her in the arena,” Gudrun Von Tevenar suggests to international endurance rider Jackie Lloyd, who has come to view the nine-year-old Zim Nazka as a potential competitive prospect. There is one hitch. Nazka’s background is as a broodmare and she has never been properly backed. The Lancashire-based rider wasn’t discouraged from making the five-hour trip to Kent to view the Arabian daughter of G Halim Sharib by the news that she had no competition CV. But she did think twice about climbing into the saddle of a horse who’d merely been sat on four years previously, as well as a few days before by Gudrun’s friend. “I had already walked into Nazka’s stable and fallen in love with her, but riding could have been a different matter,” remembers Jackie. “However, within minutes we were walking, trotting and even cantering around the arena. I thought immediately, ‘I trust this mare’. She was sound and sensible minded.” Within a couple of weeks, Jackie had transported the grey to her Lancashire home. She gave her a week to chill in a field and then commenced her education. “I put on a headcollar and took her for long walks around my local lanes for a week,” says Jackie. “Then I put on a saddle and started riding her around the roads. And that’s how easy it was. Soon we were doing pleasure rides, gradually extending the distances.” Nazka went on to become Highpoint Champion of Lancashire Endurance GB for four consecutive years. She finished in the top 10 nationally with Endurance GB over the same period, and for three years she trained with the British squad. Last year, when she turned 18, Nazka started to compete in veteran classes, finishing second nationally.
Older and wiser
Nazka’s story is a copybook one of a horse being successfully backed late. With a mind more mature than a three- or four-year-old, she took the experience of having a rider on her back in her proverbial stride. While it is not the ‘norm’, numerous horses are backed late. They may, like Nazka, have had a career as a broodmare beforehand, or fate may have consigned them to a field for their formative years. “Riding horses are usually broken in between two and four years old, often at three because they are less powerful and tend to be easier to back as a result,” says Liz Brown MRCVS, Britain’s senior eventing team vet. “At three, the skeleton is sufficiently developed, although they are weak muscularly, so they are usually turned away again once they are broken, before coming back into work at four. “If a horse is broken late, it will have spent many years doing its own thing, so for some horses that will make the breaking process more difficult.”
“If a horse is broken late, it will have spent years doing its own thing, and that can make the process more difficult”
Becky Congdon probably doesn’t agree with Liz’s sentiments. Her family provided a temporary home for a herd of Lundy ponies. The majority found new homes, although Becky kept the mahogany bay 13hh stallion Braetor Kingfisher. “He was gelded in the autumn at six, then backed the following spring. He never gave any hint of trouble; never a buck, kick, side-step or swishing tail. If he had shown any issues I would have taken it slower until he was comfortable, but he seemed almost glad to have a job and earn some pats,” says Becky. “Seven is not so late to be broken, but it’s probably quite unusual to be untamed, then a stallion, then backed, then a child’s confidence giver, which is what Kingfisher went on to be.”
The fear factor
Somerset-based Vicki Savage can empathise with the statement that breaking late is fraught with difficulty. Vicki took on an eight-year-old Thoroughbred called Tintin from a friend’s
father and received expert help when breaking him in. “We started from scratch and didn’t rush it,” she says. “He was pretty receptive to being ridden, but soon decided what the village perimeters were and would go no further. “He loved jumping, though, and I started cubbing him. At one meet he was startled by a hound on a steep slope, fell and then suffered from anaphylactic shock as his under belly and groin area were badly stung by nettles. “At the next meet he had a panic attack. After this he would only hack so far in a group of horses before stretching down onto his hocks, spinning round and reversing into anything. His blind panic would only stop if I dismounted.” Eventually, all of Vicki’s hacking companions disappeared, their confidence in tatters, and Tintin’s behaviour was starting to affect her nerve too. His panic attacks increasing, she rode him out one last time, already having made the decision to put him to sleep — he was simply too dangerous to sell on. “I don’t know if there was something physically or mentally wrong, but his brother, although only broken two years late, was also destroyed after becoming too dangerous. Someone once said to me that horses broken late sometimes decide that they just don’t want to be ridden.”
Racing ahead
Captain Nolan, by the racing sire Silver Patriarch, was broken in at the age of 10 by event rider Gavin Connell. Although a few brief attempts had been made to back the grey while he was in racing, he was labelled unrideable and returned to his owners, Christopher and Victoria Coldrey. They turned him out in a field for five years. “When I returned from living in Guernsey, I decided to try backing him,” says Gavin. “I took him back to the beginning and long-reined him on the roads, then took the plunge and got on. He’s been incredibly good right from the start.” Gavin has gone on to event Captain Nolan. “I’ve got a horse with an older body, so I’m not going to worry that I’m putting too much strain on him. He’s got a young and quirky head, but I can still apply a little pressure to that too.” Gavin thinks there are many positives to be found in first backing a horse who is not far off his teens. “Older horses have stamina and strength, while weedy yearlings will try something for a couple of minutes and then get tired,” he adds. Gavin has brought on Captain Nolan carefully, a method Liz Brown also advocates. “An older horse that has spent its time in a field will not have developed its back or core muscles to carry a rider, even though it may have developed a certain amount of strength depending on the terrain,” she says. “So, you have a horse fully developed skeletally, but which will still need some conditioning and training to strengthen its muscles appropriately. The horse will need to be trained progressively to develop the muscles in its neck, back and limbs so that it can carry itself and a rider, but this must be done steadily, with the right kind of work.”
“An older horse will need to be trained progressively to develop the muscles needed to carry itself and a rider”
A gift horse
Amy Powell couldn’t afford a ‘made’ horse, but when she discovered three unbacked ponies — including a nine-year-old 14hh Welsh section C mare called Ellie — in a field close to her home she took them on as projects. Eventually, after successfully breaking in the dam and her two offspring, one of whom was Ellie, the owner gave the excitable mare to Amy as a 21st birthday present. But she proved opinionated and wilful. “Ellie knew her own mind, being the age she was,” she says. “I remember we’d spend some sessions just walking backwards. I soon learnt that on those days it was best to get off and try another day.” However, Amy believes that Ellie’s age also helped them to form a strong bond. “I’m not sure our bond would have come about if she had been a young, naive four-year-old when we started out, as we had to really connect before she would let me do much with her,” says Amy, who adds that the sweet itch sufferer never missed a day of work through injury. “My vet said that she was the fittest and soundest 19-year-old pony she had ever seen.” All-round rider Charlie Handley had a similarly positive experience after buying the neglected 10-year-old 12.2hh Scooby Doo, a coloured Welsh part-bred pony, at a farm sale. “We thought we’d have a few issues breaking an older rescue pony, but he was a superstar. The only problem we had was mounting, so we spent 10 minutes a day just getting on and off. After three days he was perfect and has never looked back.” In the six years since, Scooby Doo has appeared in the show ring, dressage arena, on cross-country courses and in the hunting field, proving that late breaking has been a win-win scenario for him. Liz Brown concludes: “One of the key factors in backing at any age is how the horse is handled. If it is backed by a calm and confident person, the experience will be better for the horse.”