Balance

Three days. Three disciplines. One horse. One rider. And the same demand on them all the way through. Balance.

Day one. Dressage. A day balance is most on show. Every movement, marked out of ten.

I think dressage is the most important with the balance, just because in there it's just you and the horse. No one's there to help you. If you make one wee blip, the horse can feel it through, and then the judge can feel it as well.

Just the two of you in here, and the balance between you. The judge sees every bit of it.

The horses should be up in good balance and have more of the weight on the hind legs. And they're going to be in good balance. The rider has to have a very soft and nice connection, and the horses are moving forward by themselves. In good balance and good bend in the lateral work. And that will also gain them for the cross country.

Well, for the horses I think it's very important to keep them in the best mental state possible for being able to achieve, particularly dressage, calmness, and just keep working with them to be as relaxed as they possibly can.

It can be quite tricky when you go into a main arena like that. And you get a bit startled and the tension, the horse can feel it through the tension. So you've just got to keep your cool.

Stay relaxed and the horse stays relaxed. The mental balance becomes the physical balance. That's really what's being judged in here as much as anything.

You can't have physical balance without mental balance, I feel. So you've got to stay as relaxed as possible. And if your mind's relaxed, your body's relaxed. And then that helps to the balance.

Day two. Cross country. What you built in the dressage, you spend out here. Twenty odd fences, six minutes or so.

The cross country is the biggest weighted bit, but for me, you know, teach them horses for the dressage, and that they're on your aids, and that will really help you throughout all three phases.

The rider really needs to look to provide the horse with the right balance and engagement on the approach. That would bring the horse back into engagement on his hocks, to give us a nice jump up and down over the hocks, so we want to get nice airtime so that we land again, land in balance.

Every fence is really the same job, dressed up differently. Come in balanced, jump well, leave balanced. On to the next one.

All three disciplines, they all linked together, muscular, mental strength, but it all starts up here.

Cross country gets the crowds, but you don't win the three day events on the cross country alone. You win them by holding the balance across all three days.

Day three. Show jumping. Now you're asking day one's precision from a horse that did day two.

On a three day you have a horse that's tired, has been going fast and not always jumping in the perfect shape that we have for what we want for show jumping. So then we bring them to the show jumping on the final day and we're asking them to be careful and bascule and jump lovely and round through their backs. That can be difficult.

One unbalanced stride, one pole on the floor, four faults, and everything that went before is undone.

I'd say the most important thing is the balance and mindset.

So now the balance is in your head, jumping a course you can jump in your sleep with everything riding on it.

All of this. Three days, three phases. Underneath it all, it's a horse and a rider, and you don't get there on your own.

Well, it's got to be a partnership. You've got to get on well, and if the rider doesn't like the horse it's never going to be any good. And if the horse doesn't like the rider, I'm afraid it's time for the horse to move on to somebody that he does like.

A brilliant horse can make a very ordinary rider look quite special, and a brilliant rider can make an ordinary horse look special. But at the end of the day, if they're going to be winning at the top level, it's got to be a complete partnership.

Just remember why you're doing it. We enjoy the sport, we love the horses, and that's what gets us out of bed and brings us to these competitions.

It's fifty fifty. I always say, we're looking after you and feeding you. If I get the stride wrong around cross country, I'm expecting you to bail me out and help me.

Three days, three disciplines, the same question, asked three different ways. And the answer in the end is always the same one. Balance.