Name a top American showjumping rider – almost any top rider – and changes are he (or she) has learnt the craft under the guidance of the most influential teacher of modern times… George Morris
We asked one of Australia’s showjumping stars – Colleen Brook – to report back on her time with the master teacher – and we think you’ll find her interview (conducted with the assistance of friend and fellow rider – Vicki Roycroft) fascinating reading…
At last an opportunity to train (briefly) with world famous jumper trainer – George Morris. George was a silver medallist at the Rome Olympics before he started teaching full-time, and for twenty years he has coached all over the world. In the early 1980’s he started competing on the Grand Prix circuit again… not only in the USA but in Europe as well, In 1984, he was long listed for the Los Angeles Games. Not a bad effort!
So to our lessons. George is a stickler for punctuality, neatness, discipline and safety. He has a careful systematic approach to his lessons with seemingly an endless array of exercises to improve his pupils.
He is not interested in fashions or fads – a real classical teacher. He says he is not a quick fix it man and believes there is no quick way. His attention to detail is acute. Even when you are jumping a difficult exercise if one little thing isn’t right you hear about it! He taught riders four different rein releases, how to use a whip and voice. He leaves nothing to chance. The improvement in his pupils – OVERNIGHT – was astounding. Anyone blaming their horse for mistakes didn’t fair well. A loud – ‘Don’t show your ignorance’ filled the air.
“Learn to ride with knowledge, not force”, “Smooth”, “Use your brain – seat of the pants riding isn’t good enough any more!” We heard the phrases many times.
Between clinics we attended a two day show, and George turned up at 8am to help us at the practice fence and stayed all day – situating himself so he could watch the riders at the practice fence and on the course at the same time. The man loves jumping horses and riders!
George is obviously well versed in the Art of Riding, and encourages his pupils and onlookers to study the works of the masters.
George believes Australia to be a sleeping giant in talent and horses but ‘talent is a dime a dozen – work is the only way to succeed.’
That’s George.
You have been teaching here for nine days on both sides of the country by now you should have some idea of our horses and riders?
You country is much the same as America, Canada, England and Ireland, there is a horse culture – and much the same as our American culture where there is a bit of western, pioneer flavor combined.
As a society you are very refreshing – like we were fifteen, twenty years ago – not just the riding but the whole land is like that. There are many plusses to the situation, and like our country fifteen years ago, a great deal of potential, a lot of athletic, intelligent people who have grown up with horses and they have a horse background – and a nice lot of Thoroughbred stock to draw from. You have quite a number of horses bred in your country – which we don’t have any more because we have so many racetracks that we can’t get our hands on Thoroughbreds as readily as we did twenty years ago.
Again, and we went through exactly the same thing, the percentage of really educated horsemen is small, and that’s got to change… and can change and that’s the nice thing about it. That is the one thing that doesn’t even take money to change! It takes a nucleus of people that are dedicated, that want to improve the game not only for their own competitive success but to improve the game as a whole and help people… to help them to be better caretakers, and better trainers and better teachers. I would say that your country is still a diamond a little bit in the rough but it doesn’t have to stay there.
I think you have got a top layer that is really close to international standard, and you have some individuals who could, on a given day with a little luck, win the Nations Cup at Aachen if everything went right. But you want to have more depth than that, so that if everything didn’t go quite right you’d still have a chance.
I think your top layer – of which there is not that many – is at least a nice top layer. What you have got to do then is fill in from the bottom so that you keep expanding that base. That’s the problem all the Europeans have.
The top layer in England, Germany, France and Switzerland, is as good as ours. It can go any old way – at Aachen it could have gone five ways. But the big difference between our country and the Europeans is the broad base we have.
I am a big believer in clinics and travelling abroad. Like you, we have to travel abroad, and invite people – like course builders – to come to our country. We have a great number of clinicians, not so many in jumping as in eventing or dressage, but every year we invite one famous individual like Hans Winkler, or Piero D’Inzeo, or Nelson Pessoa, to come to Gladstone and give our short list a clinic. We are still an isolated country, and Europe is the centre of where it is at and always will be. I think you would be surprised how quickly the base could widen and the standard improve with more and more association clinics and more travel.
How important have your equitation classes been?
We hold great stead in that. It’s done us a great service and we’ve had that forever and it does give every child a start riding at horse shows, it gives them a pretty sound and logical start. Not everyone goes on from there, and there could be considered some drawbacks in there, in that it might produce some soft riders and weak riders – hot house plants… That has to be balanced out as they grow older and ride green horses and rough horses, and trips to Europe and big jumps and muddy footing. That’s our drawback but those equitation classes provide a wonderful base that can never go wrong.
Years ago, I taught in South Africa for two or three years in a row, and a very astute horsewoman down there – Charlotte Stubbs – gravitated right onto this equitation division. She came to the Garden and watched them play finals… Now it’s a big, big deal in South Africa. It was a really new thing there for them.
You talk of a number of great teachers who have influenced you…
My first great teacher I met luckily when I was only twelve years old – I started with a man called Gordon Wright who will go down in history as the premier American teacher that we will ever have. He came out of Fort Riley – he had been a cowboy before the war, then he went to Fort Riley to our cavalry school. Fort Riley officers went to the Saumur in France, and to Italy. They were Italian/French oriented much more than German oriented, which was lucky for us because it fitted our horses much better.
Those officers, like Harry Chamberlin, came back to Fort Riley and produced many many good horsemen. Billy Steinkraus went to Fort Riley. Gordon Wright came out after the Second World War and set up outside of New York and he taught many equitation riders, many people who went onto the team, and perhaps more important, he taught many people who went on to teach. The names would not mean anything to you, but they are very successful American teachers. I would be naturally his most famous student, but that would not be unusual because I have worked hard and made my mark. He set the stage for American riding through the forties and fifties. Then I went from him to Bertelan de Nemethy, a Hungarian who went from the Hungarian Cavalry to Hannover, and combined Hungarian School, which was very Italian oriented, with the German. So you see this triangle in American equitation of Italian jumping, French dressage and German discipline. I always tell people that it is a triangle of those three, with perhaps English hunting it could be considered four pronged.
Bert really refined my riding, and showed me many things – especially on the flat, and gymnastic development of the horse. Bert sent me to a man called Richard Watjen who was very famous pre-war, a great German rider of the old, fine school. He was very elegant, very quiet, very soft and very classical. I would say that my next major teacher was a Dane – Gunner Andersen. Gunner Andersen is one of the great dressage teachers of all time in Europe. He trained Liz Hartel who had polio, and was second in two Olympic Games. She had to be carried from a wheel chair to the horse, and yet he trained her to win silver medals at two Olympic Games. He was the best flat rider I’ve ever seen in my life. He is still highly regarded in Europe as a foundation dressage teacher – the walk, trot and canter had to be absolutely correct before moving on to advanced work.
I was very lucky I spent a year with him. He was living in America and I stayed with him and his wife – he was working with Jessica Newberry who is a very fine dressage rider and a good friend. I had a real saturation with high levels of dressage.
After those people I really became a teacher and now I’ll get home Friday, and Jessica is coming up to teach at my farm, and I’ll have a lesson with her… I still stay on top of my own riding as much as possible. I learn just going around the world.
You’ve had many famous pupils…
I’m very lucky at this point of time in that I have many famous pupils. In the World Championship Team – Conrad Homfeld, Katie Monahan, Katharine Burdsall, and Lisa Tarnopol, who was reserve. On the Olympic Team, Conrad Homfeld, Melanie Smith, Leslie Burr-Lenehan;
Ann Kursinski was reserve. In the World Cup Finals in ’79 – Katie Monahan tied with Hugo Simon. In 1980, Conrad Homfeld. 1982 – Melanie Smith, 1983 – Norman Delio Joio, ’84 – Mario Deslauriers was trained by Ian Millar who was my pupil; ’85 Homfeld again; ’86 – Leslie Burr.
As far as junior riders are concerned, in American I have had over 30 Champions or Reserves in the finals of the Equitation classes. I’ve been very lucky. I’ve worked hard, and I’ve had a lot of talented people, and I’ve promoted them through this very basic system of riding – and the combination of dressage and the jumping, and the natural hunting heritage have all come together. It has worked. It is a very straight forward system.
Colleen Brook and Talkind, the horse she took to the WEG in 1990
I was impressed by how simple that system is…
The most important aspect is that you have a system as a horseman. Somebody interviewed Conrad a few years ago about his life, and being with me, because he was with me for seven years from when he was very young, he said: ‘Well as a start, which is not true of many teachers, George is a good horseman and a good rider.’ Many teachers aren’t, they are not good riders, they are not good horseman, maybe they get by as teachers. My first interest – which I can’t promote at clinics at all – if you came to my place you would see I am really hipped into running a good place, on maintaining a good place, on stable management, and I am really fanatical about that.
Unfortunately there is just not enough time to get into that aspect of it in clinics – but that is number one. Start at the base and maintain the horse. Even if it is not a fancy place – the important thing is the maintenance of the horse.
Then you need a real sound system based on your experience and knowledge – a real sound system that you stick to, that you believe in. It doesn’t matter if my system is a little different from yours, as long as you really stick to a system you believe in. You can change it here and there – add to it, subtract from it- but the basic system must run true to form. Then you have to discover the basic mechanics of teaching people. The mechanics of discipline – discipline is the absolute cornerstone of my riding existence and I absolutely believe in it. To be perfectly frank, the discipline approach really works with women. To any emotional tides or ups and downs, it holds them true to form and allows their emotion to work for them.
I believe that most women I have worked with need a system and a ground man, more than men. They need confidence and support – I believe women can win more than men because of their sensitivity and their flair but they need the confidence and support of a system. Teaching revolves around explanation. You’ve got to be able to explain everything, and there has got to be an answer… even if it’s not the right answer, there’s got to be an answer. You have to explain theory and if there is a problem you’ve got to be able to solve it.
Demonstration is a very nice string to a teacher’s bow, that you can get on and demonstrate something – or if the teacher is out of it, or too old, they should have a pupil who is a disciple who can get on and correct a horse.
Then application is where the student practices in front of the teacher. Correction is the correction of the student and the horse by the teacher – and there is the teaching principle that there is always something wrong! Maybe it is just the angle of the thumb, or the distance to the jump, or the angle of the jump, or the bascule of the horse, or the rider’s back, there is always something that could be better. This is what amazes people. They go to the Tampa Show, and it overwhelms them to see fifty people who look good. ‘How do you do that?’ they want to know. ‘How can you produce a whole country that not only ride pretty well – win a lot – but look good?’ – and that is this detailed work… teaching. They do it in dance, they do it in theatre, they do it in other sports, but riding is way behind other sports when it comes to education. It is all detail, and the better detailed person you are, the better success you have.
You mentioned that you much preferred to teach in a group situation, rather than private…
I don’t even mind if it’s a group of two – I really dislike privates, because there is the lack of opportunity to watch the other, to pick up good and bad from the other. The competitiveness of the group is very healthy. I don’t stir up people, I don’t pit people against each other, but just the fact that four or five people are doing a set together. Each is going to try and do the work more smoothly, more accurately, than the other one … of its own volition it stirs competition, and we are training competitors.
But if you get bogged down in one to one private lessons, it really does not elevate in as healthy a fashion, as a group. If there is an exceptional problem, a real fear problem, or a real horse problem, that might need one to one.
What are the areas in which we need to work?
The biggest problem is because the base is not educated – your riders are intuitive horsemen but they are not always educated and polished. They get it done, and they have to get it done by force! If you don’t know how to do it through two thousand years of knowledge from Xenophon down to our time, then if you are going to get it done, you are going to get it done by force. We all use force to some degree but the balance here is too much force and not enough knowledge, and when that knowledge becomes deeper and deeper and deeper and deeper, the force is going to become less and less and less.
How does that affect our jumpers at the top level?
I think horses pay for it physically, maybe not your horse, but maybe the horses that belong to people just a little down the ladder; they pay for it physically. Leg wise, back wise, brain wise, they pay. At the very least when you use force they are going to look back at you a little more and jump a little flatter. When a horse is looking back at force that means their heads come up, they contract their jaw, they contract their backs, everything is flatter. Nothing beats a relaxed, rounded horse.
Looking at the grading system, what is the way forward for Australia?
Well the grading system I think is wrong. We have our annual five day convention where we discuss all the rules over and over again and rules over and over again and through trial and error, we have been down all the roads, and looked at most classes. Some compete by going fast over low fences, some over big big fences, we’ve been down all the roads. I think it is a mistake to hold a big scopey Grand Prix horse in a lower grade where he has to run against the clock over low fences when he is not supposed to do that, he is an Olympic prospect! Allow him to skip a grade on the decision of the trainer. We have a system where our preliminary is comparable to your D
& C. We have a low preliminary and a big preliminary, and that’s $2500 to get out of it, or one year of showing. You win the $2500 before the year is out, you have the year and then you are out. To get through B grade, it’s another year to win $5000 – win $5000 and you still have the year. So you are talking about two years to get out of our intermediate, which is comparable to your B grade. So you for sure have two nice years with a very talented horse. Now if you have such a precocious horse that it would be better for him to start doing low opens or even a low Grand Prix, you can upgrade without jeopardizing your standard in the lower grades – you can come back.
We might have a new B grade that we take to the mid-west and do some low Grand Prix in the summer, and come back to Florida and into the B grade/intermediate. To absolutely hold a big scopey young horse down and make him run over low jumps is wrong. You are always going to produce your speed horses and your amateur horses – you like any country want to work out how to protect your Olympic prospects. The others will take care of themselves – why worry about them. It’s that 3-4%, the ones you can’t replace, that you want to protect.
George on Sky High…
We seem to have problems producing the right sort of horse…
Our system is now very accurate. Our problem is that we have so many Grand Prix, Sunday after Sunday after Sunday, and so much money, that Frank Chapot and I are always pulling our hair out, keeping a lid on our top horses. Stay home, don’t try and be Horse of the Year, Horseman of the Year, Horsewoman of the Year, stay home. Our problem is ‘Katie, Michael, Conrad… whoever it is, this thing is going to Seoul. Don’t show, stay home.’ Each country has its own problems.
Where do we go with our courses?
The courses I have seen in Australia have been very good. We all keep learning from Olaf Petersen, Ann Carruthers, Bert de Nemethy, we keep learning from each other. Showjumping cannot get higher, wider, faster. It is as high, wide and fast as it is going to go. It is getting more and more to the subtle sophistication, the refinement of riding and training. The distances, the turns, the angles have to become more acute. The fences have to become lighter so that a slight override at the wrong time knocks down a jump, because the cups are flatter and the rails are lighter. A subtle nuance of a bad ride, not a big bad ride, but just a tiny bit of an off ride, knocks down a jump.
No matter what they say about scope, they say we are going to need horses with scope- that’s bull! Scope is always a big deal. Scope means wide, whether it’s long to wide or short to wide, it means wide. I didn’t see enough shows down here, but I would be suspect that with your English heritage you can jump verticals all day at the top of the standards, that’s not a problem, but you’ve got to include wide, so that when you go away you can handle what you might not do as well.
Your American courses look a bit like cross between the English and the European, they are not upright and airy like the English, but then not as long and heavy looking as the European…
I think Europe and America are coming back to light… but wide. Whereas England doesn’t have the wide. We are coming back to lighter and so is Europe. When I see a show in Europe or American usually every question is asked in a good course. It’s hard to cheat! It breaks down to the fact, can your horse gallop, on a loose rein, as fast as he can go in the grand prix jump off, make a couple of turns, gallop belly to the ground, and still be careful?
In the Olympic Squad clinic that you held, you said quite a few times ‘no leg’. Now most of our riders would probably think that meant exactly what it says – but after a listening to you for a few more days at the second clinic, the emphasis changed a little. Why did it change?
Well you have hot Thoroughbred horses with natural impulsion. The legs and spurs produce impulsion. Why produce impulsion on horses that already have it. We are all brought up – I was the same – we’re told leg, leg, leg. I saw movies last year of my riding in the Rome Games and we were coming out of the comers on Thoroughbred horses and really gunning them. It looked very funny, it looked very different. When you already have impulsion, and you add more impulsion, you are going to get a horse that is quick and flat and is going to hit the fence. So you take one horse to a fence, no leg. Another horse to the jump – some leg, another, a cold horse, a lot of leg. It all has to be thought out. It’s brainwashing. Like pinching with the knee. We were all taught to grip with the knee, we were all taught to leg a horse to a jump. That was the right way to jump a horse, every horse, every jump. That’s wrong!
Where do we go in the future?
I think the future work for the Australians is to get the teachers really cranked up. Even the people who are good riders but not teachers, and they have working students with them, they should really get cranked up about spreading education. Something like that looks hard, it looks difficult… but I can promise you, having started riding right after the war and having ridden forty years, I saw exactly the same thing. Luckily I’ve run the gauntlet, right from after the war to now, and I’ve seen the tremendous improvement.
Where does George Morris go from here?
Semi retirement maybe. Live around Sydney… go down to the beach. No. I love teaching, I enjoy it, and I never get tired of it. I very much enjoy visiting different countries, especially countries with potential. In the last five or six years, I’ve taught in sixteen countries.
This article first appeared in the March 1987 issue of THM.
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