Story and photos by Andrew Lindsey
I first met Linda Treur some years ago when I was working at a small Warmblood stud at Wynnum, on Brisbane’s south side. She came to break in a couple of youngsters, and being eager to learn all I could, I was never far away when she worked with the horses.
I was immediately impressed with her professionalism and her clear logical way of explaining things. Therefore, when I bought a young Warmblood of my own, it was to Linda that I went for instruction on how to guide this young horse through the first stages of his training. Many of her methods and principles, although often contrary to those I had been taught in the past, made greater sense to me.
Linda is a rider and trainer of worldwide experience. Beginning her equestrian career on the family racehorse and Welsh Pony stud in Holland, she began riding at age three and breaking in ponies at eight. Later, upon completing her teaching degree, she embarked on an equestrian career spanning eight countries in four continents, gaining experience with many different horses and disciplines. It is my admiration for and aspiration to this wealth of experience that has brought me back to have lessons with Linda whenever I am at home from my own travels.
It was at one of these lessons that Linda told me she was going to hold a clinic on the great showjumper Caprilli. “Who is Caprilli?” I asked stupidly. Being largely a dressage rider myself, the world of showjumping remains fairly ambiguous to me. Of course, I had heard of the popular ‘Bates Caprilli’ saddle, but who was this Caprilli guy? So, ever keen to expand my knowledge of this wondrous sport, I put my name down for Linda’s clinic.
The first half of the day is spent in a theory lesson, in which Linda tells of the life of Caprilli and explains his innovations and principles. Captain Frederico Caprilli was born in Italy in 1868 and life led him to the military at an early age. It was in the cavalry that he gained his equestrian education and he soon began teaching at the Italian Cavalry School of Tor di Quinto, where he became chief instructor. Thus, it was on military principles that his innovations would be based.
“Caprilli developed a completely new style of riding over jumps,” Linda explains. “Up until his time, the riding position was based on the knights of the middle-ages who were heavily armoured and rode with a long stirrup and were quite immobile. In this style, riders before Caprilli rode over obstacles leaning back in the saddle and hoping for the best. Leaning back like this went against the horse’s natural movement, putting pressure on the horse’s back so that even if the horse cleared the fence with the front legs, often they would knock a rail with the back.
“Caprilli spent a lot of time watching horses jump riderless in the wild. He studied how the horse’s body worked and from his observations he developed a completely new theory of how a jump should be ridden.”
Caprilli’s first principle was the forward seat. The forward seat, or ‘two-point position’ as it is known in Australia, meant that the rider rode slightly bent forward from the hips with a shorter stirrup. The rider would keep their centre of gravity forward and their weight off the horses back over the jump. In this way the rider would conform to the natural motion of the horse rather than hinder it by forcing him into an unnatural outline.
“This forward seat completely revolutionised showjumping,” Linda says. “With Caprilli’s style of riding fences, horses could clear jumps of 2.08 metres high and 6.5 metres wide.”
Linda picks a particularly tall member of her audience and measures his height against the arena column. Picking a point far above her own diminutive stature, she estimates the height of this monstrous jump, demonstrating the incredible feats that horses are capable of if we let them. Caprilli himself said that a capable horse will “measure his obstacle and decide on his own, the strength he needs to clear it without the rider requiring to add any more.”
“Caprilli’s second principle was to not interfere with the horse’s judgement,” Linda explains. “Caprilli developed his ideas from techniques and riding styles that nomadic horseman, like the Arabs, Mongols and Berbers, have been using for centuries. They originally rode bareback and therefore they had to learn to go with the horse. On the other hand, the European classical system taught riders to have strict control over the horse.”
Caprilli shunned this idea of the rider controlling the horse’s every step. He advocated that a horse is quite capable of finding his own point of take off and that “horses perform best when the rider interferes least.” He stated that: “A horse schooled on my principles knows enough, when jumping, to realize that he is about to need extra energy and therefore acts accordingly. Any interference on the part of the rider can only be harmful.”
Linda now shows a fascinating video about the history of the equestrian sport in the Olympic Games. “I haven’t been able to find any footage of Caprilli himself and there may not be any, but this video has some very good showjumping footage soon after Caprilli’s techniques became popular.”
The video begins with the 1912 Olympics in Stockholm. Sweden had been campaigning for the inclusion of the equestrian events for years and the Stockholm Games were the first to do so. By the 1920s equestrian, especially the showjumping, was a popular event in the Olympics and was dominated by the military.
The fast, black and white footage clearly depicts the prevalence, in early Olympic equestrian events, of Caprilli’s style. His teachings would soon put Italy at the forefront of competition showjumping. In the video, legendary German showjumper Hans Günter Winkler says of the 1960 Rome games, “In Rome, the Italians were unbeatable. It was as if they were the Ferraris out in front and we were behind in our old bangers.” By that time Caprilli’s ‘Il Sistema’ was firmly rooted in the cavalry schools of Europe and had been adopted by showjumpers the world over.
“As with most revolutionary ideas” Linda explains, “Caprilli’s system was at first shunned by the rest of the riding community but with his success, many realised the benefits of his system and came from all over Europe to learn from him.”
Over lunch, the talk is inevitably horsey. We chat as only those with similar passions can, and soon it is time for the afternoon’s agenda. The riders are divided into two groups and those not riding are to judge the performance of those who are. The idea of the practical riding session is to practise the forward and light (three and two point) seat and then to put our knowledge to practice in an abbreviated form of a ‘Caprilli test’.
The Caprilli test can be described as a dressage test over jumps, performed in Europe as a qualification for showjumpers. The same control and correctness is required as in dressage, but the rider must also demonstrate their ability over the obstacles in the Caprilli style.
Linda begins by making sure all of the riders are clear on the difference between the upright, forward and light positions: “While you’re sitting on your horse, you can be sitting in the upright position. And now all you need to do in order to get into the forward position is make your reins a bit shorter and bring your shoulders more in line with your knee, so you have a line- toe, knee, shoulder. Now forward to rising trot….”
“The difference really is that in a slightly forward seat, the hands are a touch more forward compared to the saddle, but not that much. In Caprilli tests the jumps are fairly low but it’s all about the quality of the line in between. All right, go large arena and go forward to the two point position or the light seat, where you slightly hover above the saddle….”
The riders circle the arena at a trot, cross the diagonals and traverse trotting poles, all the while alternating between the upright and light position, practicing changing between the two. Linda prepares them to go over some small jumps:
“Now that we’re getting ready for jumping, it’s crucial that you have enough distance so that if the horse in front knocks a rail you have enough time to turn away…”
The riders practice over a few low jumps and then it is time to try their hands at a Caprilli test.
“This is a very short version of a Caprilli test, they are normally as long as a dressage test, but it will give you an idea of what is expected,” Linda explains. The riders take turns to ride the routine and afterwards everyone discusses each rider’s performance, those standing on the sidelines provide valuable praise or constructive criticism.
The feeling is one of happy achievement among the riders after riding their Caprilli test and the consensus, that Linda has provided some valuable practical know-how and given an insight to how the equestrian sport came to be as it is today.
Annette Peters of Manly was particularly pleased, having had the privilege of riding four-year-old Holsteiner gelding- HP Luzifer, one of Linda’s up and coming stars. “It’s great to come to clinics and see different riders, you can learn so much from watching other people,” she said. “I have been to many different teachers but I find Linda the best. She explains things in such a clear and logical way and it’s a privilege to ride one of her horses. She’s not just standing there; she’s riding the horse with you.”
Bianca Banchetti, one of Linda’s younger pupils at eleven years of age rides Cherie, a pretty Palomino mare. “I get lessons with Linda and she really helps me a lot,” she said. “I really enjoyed the clinic. I didn’t know anything about Caprilli, but I learnt a lot today.”
Now that Linda has established her training facilities, including a brand new indoor arena, at her property in Luscombe, she is in full swing training horses and giving lessons. She intends to conduct more clinics in the upcoming months to provide her students, and everyone with a love for horses, with invaluable insight and training in the equestrian disciplines.
It is ironic that the life of Captain Frederico Caprilli was ended by his life’s love, the thing that he had devoted his life to. What is even more ironic is the manner in which it ended. Having spent his life training cavalry to gallop over rough terrain, and sailing over immense obstacles in the showjumping arena, Caprilli died in a chance accident when his horse slipped in the snow on a simple, sedate ride from one town to another. Caprilli fell, breaking his neck, at the age of thirty nine.
He will be remembered however, as one of the great innovators of the equestrian sport and his teachings and words remain relevant to this day-
“The principal lesson to be learnt is that the rider should be at pains to allow the horse to jump with his natural movement. Sounds exactly like the fourth secret of perfect horsemanship: give, let go, free the horse; in order to be victorious in horsemanship, the rider must surrender.”
– Frederico Caprilli