An interview with Christopher Hector

Photos: Roz Neave, Jacques Toffi, Kenneth Braddick and archives

 When I interviewed you at Aachen in 1991, did you think you would still be competing here, twenty five years later?

“Not really,” Isabell chuckles, “I was not so focused on it, more on my studies, and then I planned to start my profession as a lawyer and I expected that I wouldn’t have time to compete, and that I would change my focus and my priorities. But then life plays out in different ways. There came the decision, what happens with our farm? What should I do? And then I had the luck to make my hobby and my passion into my profession. Luckily I am still here – and in good shape!”

Aachen, 1991, with the beautiful Fabienne

It hasn’t always been in such a good shape, you’ve had wonderful times at the top, but then some not so wonderful times, and you’ve always managed…

“To come back again… but this is the life of an athlete, you can’t stay on top the whole time – you will have your ups and downs. The challenge is always to come back after a down. All the time I was in a very comfortable position with great horses, not always with a championship horse, but always with horses where I could stay on a good international level, in the top ten or top fifteen, and always with very talented young horses coming up, so you never lost the motivation.”

“But these moments give you the background that you can come back, that it is possible, that you have to keep on going and find a solution, to find the key for each horse. There is no horse without some problem, without some ups and downs, and the goal is to find a key and not to give up – if this one doesn’t work, we have to find another one. This is what I really love to do, and why I am still here at Aachen, I really love to improve and build up horses into the Grand Prix sport. To get a vision of a young horse, to think it through, this one could come up to a top Grand Prix level, and then to go through the difficulties, through the years, four or five years to bring them up. This is what I really love in the sport, this is what makes it timeless.”

Gigolo, the partnership won Individual Silver and team Gold Sydney, Individual and Team Gold Atlanta, Silver and Team Gold at Barcelona, and Individual and Team Gold
at Rome WEG in 1998

Warum Nicht – World Cup final winner, 2007

Do you have a set of criteria for a horse that you will take on? Because a lot of your horses look very different, when you went from Warum Nicht to El Santo, a journalist friend said, Isabell’s gone from riding a Giraffe to a Hippopotamus…

 El Santo – 5th in the World Cup Lyon, 6th in Las Vegas

“It’s always with each horse the first view: it’s elasticity, the basic, the movement, the trot, the canter, the walk, then you have to think how it could look after a while, after the gymnastic – how can I build up the muscles? Take Don Johnson, he needed five, six years, before he was really safe in his muscles, before I changed his body. This takes time. Of course it is easier if you have a horse like Weihegold, a horse without this kind of problem. The first choice is to sit on, and get a feeling on the horse and then you can imagine how it could be in the after years.”

You must have seen something in Don Johnson that made it worth those years of training…

“When I saw him the first time standing next to the trailer, I thought how in the hell should this work? And then I saw him moving and I said, wow this horse has no bones in his body, he was so elastic. Okay, he was quite naughty, but I was thinking if I can bring the muscles in the right way, then he can become a pretty horse and a really good athlete because his mind and his elasticity were really great. It needed in the end, two years longer than it would with a horse without this kind of body, but the end result gives you a lot of self-confidence, you are really satisfied with yourself and with the horse. Look at the 2015 Europeans, to finish the Freestyle in the fourth place, it was like winning with this horse because I was so proud that that this horse could improve until he was in the top five in the world, that was great for me.”

 “It was a good result for me as a trainer and a rider.”

Don Johnson – 4th in Euros at Aachen, 2015

The support team, Madeline Winter-Schulze, and coach, Monica Theodorescu

When you started training it was with Dr Schulten-Baumer, and I think he was one of the first to bring in ideas from jumping training, of lengthening and shortening, or working on the gymnastics…

“Dr Schulten-Baumer is for sure the person that gave me the basic, and the chance to learn his way of training, to learn how to improve horses and build them up to Grand Prix. For sixteen years I worked and trained with him, and for sure I wouldn’t be sitting here without him. Now it’s about sixteen years that I have been doing it by myself, of course with help, especially from Madeline Winter-Schulze.”

“Two times I have had great luck in my life, the first time was with Dr Schulten-Baumer, and then Madeline – without both of them, I wouldn’t stay in the sport – but after Dr Schulten-Baumer, I had to prove myself, that I could do it by myself. To learn to analyse by myself, to improve the horses by myself. It needed a few years before I got the feeling, okay now you feel at home and safe with no-one sitting next to you.”

Wolfram – giving confidence (photo Jacques Toffi)

“Then I had a few years with Wolfram Wittig, he gave me the confidence. It was not that he should tell me how to do a change, it was more that there was someone sitting next to me, behind me, saying a little more here, a little more there. What I needed was someone to help me be myself.”

Another influence, Jose Garcia Mena – riding Norte at the Caen WEG

“Step by step I learned what can I do better, where are the weakest points. I’ve learned to work together with Jose Garcia Mena for the problems in piaffe for Ernie (El Santo). He gives me new ideas, he gives me a new impulse from someone who can do it better than me. That was the beginning of the partnership and the training and the work with Jose, but all the horses, my staff, my whole stable, could learn from this partnership and that was a very important step forward.”

El Santo competes at Frankfurt

Are you riding a little differently since Monica Theodorescu became the team coach?

Monica and one of her stars, Grunnox, in the line-up at Aachen in 1991 with Isabell

“Maybe not differently, but it is a very confident and close partnership because we know each other so well. She knows how I am and I know how she is, and we both know what it is to go in the big arena. She can really feel all the different situations in the warming up arena, so we really work together. With her as coach I feel really happy and comfortable and it gives you the special thing on top to have a person next to you, and behind you, who exactly knows how it works.”

Emilio at Aachen – got it right in the Special

“You never stop learning, like what happened to me on Wednesday. Emilio was in really good shape, and this year he has had only really good competitions, with close to 70%, and here at Aachen I made this really stupid mistake in the warming up, he was a bit upset outside with the atmosphere so he came in over the top. I was really angry with myself that I couldn’t present the horse in the way I should – so I really hope I can do a better job this evening.” (She did, taking out the Special with a score of 78.275)

“Twenty five years in the sport, I don’t know how many horses, and you always have to be open to learn, to work by yourself, and make it better. Monica really helps me with this.”

When Dr Schulten-Baumer’s teachings came out, they were a little controversial, the horses were very deep and round – but it wasn’t Rolkur was it?

“Definitely not Rolkur, it was of course, low and deep, and it always depended on the horse. Hannes (Warum Nicht) was a horse that from his body really needed to come low in the neck, otherwise he was like you said, a bit of a giraffe.

Hannes, warming up around the arena low and deep

I really had to form him low and deep. He was always a bit spooky so it only took two seconds for him to come up from a very nice round neck to a too uphill giraffe, so that was really a challenge to always keep him in the right attitude.”

The team – ‘Der Doktor’, Gigolo, and Isabell

Satchmo – good

Satchmo in Hong Kong – not so good… (photo – Kenneth Braddick)

“But you look at Satchmo, he required completely different riding, with Satchmo it was always a challenge to control his temperament. There was a time of about two years when he really became panicky, he was afraid, and I couldn’t find a key to calm him down, to give him confidence. We were really trying all the ways we knew – with less work, with more work, easy work, harder work, everything you normally do when you are looking for a solution. Then we found he had a problem in his eye, after the operation, there was only one situation where he was really upset about the screen and was once more scared in the competition.

Satchmo, always a challenge 

But never after, and never before did he have this problem after the eye operation. What I am saying is don’t give up, try all kinds of solutions. I don’t want to find a solution in the medicine cupboard, but sometimes you have a medical problem.”

Bella Rose, and more Bella Rose

and more

It must have been an awfully sad moment to lose Bella Rose as a competition horse through injury…

“Of course, the best horse ever, my dream horse. We’ll see, hopefully we can bring her back. This is our big hope but you never know. It’s too early to dream but there’s a chance, and I hope that I get this feeling once more.”

And of course Isabell was right and Bella Rose was her Gold Medal ride at the 2018 WEG in Tryon, and at the Tokyo Olympics. Bella Rose has now retired and has had her first foal…

And the new stars keep coming, Isabell and Quantaz (by Quaterback) at Aachen – photo Dressage-News

The now retired star – Weihegold

Team Gold and Individual Silver at Rio with Weihegold