Sarah Widdicombe
Try as I might, I cannot throw off my fascination with horses. By far my best early memory is of being placed on a small pony’s warm back and allowed to sit there all afternoon while he grazed the owner’s lawn – so simple, so blissful! Things became a bit more complicated over the years, with a bit of eventing, work on a large stud farm, preparing breeding stock for major shows, helping people with ‘problem’ horses – but, best of all, just hacking around the countryside and even through central London, where I grew up.
But something wasn’t right. The things I had learned from a vast array of teachers over the years weren’t really adding up, and my enjoyment in riding and just being with horses was often tinged with frustration and niggling failures. I had to find a way to begin truly to understand the horse.
You cannot separate the mental/emotional from the physical in the horse, and over the last 20 years I have spent countless hours studying both (yep, I’m obsessed!). I’ve discovered, watched and worked with horsemen who I think really understand what horses need from us, the ‘feel’ between horse and rider, and the ways in which we can help horses to feel better both physically and mentally each time we ride. The horses tell me every day if I am learning well.
Tom Widdicombe
My life with horses didn’t begin until I was in my thirties. I can see that in lots of ways it is an easier path for people who have grown up with horses, but on the plus side for me as a latecomer it did mean that I have absolutely questioned and thoroughly checked out everything I have come across in the horse world. That habit is still with me today. There are so many things going on that horses have to put up with, which are blatantly completely wrong for the horse.
My advice to anyone who is serious about getting it right for horses is this. Understand how you need to be for the horse to relax in your company. Understand how you need to ride the horse so that he benefits mentally and physically from the experience.
For me, horsemanship is an art to be developed and improved. When I am with the horse, practising the art is happening in each moment – we are working together to get the job done. To be able to get more for less – for me that is the joy of horsemanship.
For a few years I did get involved in running clinics, but now I have retired to run the farm and enjoy my horse. I do occasionally work with Sarah and Kate, which I enjoy.
Kate Sandel
I guess I am very similar to many other women – at a very young age I got addicted to horses, and it’s only got worse since! I had my own bumptious but much adored welsh pony as a child, and then rode at various stables and with friends for many years. I ‘did’ some cross country and some dressage and it was all fine.
And then I bought my own horse, a welsh cross, who was a bigger and more terrible version of my first pony. This mare held me in such low regard and was so inclined to do things her own way, that my usual instructors couldn’t help us. And then I stumbled upon a couple on Dartmoor working with horses in a way I hadn’t seen before and the rest, as they say, is history…
Having firmly worked my way into Tom and Sarah’s lives, I started to think I was pretty good at this horse malarkey, and then I acquired Gou – a Lipizzaner with more physical issues and neuroses than you can shake a stick at. And realised I was going to have to up my game considerably; understand as best I could how horses work physically, and how you can find something within yourself which might help them mentally. I needed to watch and work with people who were great at this; read and study; practice, practice, practice, and give up some dearly held things like goals and my ego.
I am still trying.