‘The special is actually harder for him’: Carl Hester on Fame, the Aachen heat and a David Bowie surprise to come
Carl Hester and Fame produced one of the best grand prix specials of their career – Carl breaks down the test and teases a new freestyle
Carl Hester and Fame scored 78.3% to finish sixth at the Dressage World Championships in Aachen, just over a percentage point behind Justin Verboomen and Zonik Plus in fifth – but the placing is only half the story of what was, by Carl’s own admission, one of the best rides of his career.
“It’s one of the highest scores I’ve ever had in the special,” he said. “He’s had an 80%, but one wonderful judge [Alice Schwab at K] gave me an 80% today, so it feels just as good. But what a horse to do that in this weather!"
The heatwave in Aachen – temperatures climbed to 35°C – forced a change of plan in Carl’s preparations. “Conditions affect how you warm up,” he said. “Because it’s so hot and very close, I warmed up just in the covered arena to keep the sun off his back for half an hour today.
“I made the decision to take his ear bonnet off, which could have gone either way – normally it helps him with the sound, but I thought it was too hot for that; he needs to be able to get air around him and enjoy the atmosphere as I do.
“It just shows how far he’s come, because he lights up in it now rather than run from it. I think that’s the difference between now and a few years ago – he was frightened of atmosphere and frightened of noise, and now I feel he has grown to it.”
Technically, Carl could have few complaints. “That was a really good test – he didn’t do anything wrong,” he said. “My lifelong work is always to have him better in the frame, and I think there were moments today where he was really good in that, a very rideable test. But it's a long test, and it’s draining in this heat for them, and he still had that energy on that last centre line.”
Carl Hester: “He gives me everything”
It’s the consistency that stands out most to Carl himself. “He has always, for four years now, given me everything in a championship, which is unbelievable. A championship is what I do it for – and saving him like I did this year, just to do three shows and come and do one, so he arrives with a good mind and fresh, not thinking competition is boring,” he said.
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“He surely has to be one of the most consistent horses I’ve ever had the pleasure of riding, because he just doesn’t want to make mistakes. It doesn’t matter whether it’s boiling hot or lashing with rain, or if there are thousands of people – he does what I ask. He’s such a willing horse – it was just great to ride.”
“It’s not always the case that you get the mark you feel you deserve when you ride – very often you feel you’ve had a good ride and then you’re disappointed with your score,” he added. “So to actually have the marks match my feeling was just great.”
Yesterday, when Carl entered the arena, he decided to ride in rising trot around the outside of the ring before entering. Today he walked Fame in. “In the grand prix I was just trying to ride him forward and get off his back, because he holds himself when he’s looking at things,” he explained.
“So I went rising trot yesterday to release him, because the first thing you have to do in that test is an extended trot – they’ve got to really go, and it’s not something I’m very good at either – the first extended trot. I’m a cautious rider, but I thought, I’ll go for it today – push, let go, who knows when the next ride is, go for it. And he reacted well to it.”
Asked whether the special suits Fame better than the grand prix, Carl added: “No, I don’t think so. I think if it was the other way round – if I could do the special first and the grand prix second, I think he’d be even better, because of the things on the long side, because of his little spooks,” he said.
“The grand prix, if you think about it, is mostly in the middle of the arena – the zigzag, the pirouettes, crossing the middle with the half-passes. He’s quite happy in the middle. So the special is actually a difficult test for him, because he has to stay on the wall a lot more, and I can feel him the whole time – his left eye, especially on the right rein, is constantly ‘What's that?’ and I have to ride him a bit in the test, which I love, because that’s his personality.”
“Becky Moody rode the test of her life”
Carl finished just ahead of Becky Moody and Jagerbomb in seventh, scoring 77.66% with a much improved test from the grand prix – despite a lost shoe moments before they entered the ring.
But Carl laughed off any suggestions of a friendly rivalry with his student. “There’s no rivalry at all,” he said, adding with a laugh: “I train Becky, so I can’t have her beating me at this championship, embarrassing me!
“I thought she did a phenomenal job today, and I’d easily put her test on a par with mine – she could easily have had my score. We’re a team – cliché maybe, but we’re very good mates. I wouldn’t care if she beat me.”
He had nothing but admiration for how Becky handled her scare in the warm-up. "Imagine that happening if you’re not focused – the shoe comes off before she’s even gone up. That would freak most people out. Not her. She went and did the test of her life.”
A Bowie surprise for the freestyle
The rumours doing the rounds at the showground turned out to be true: Carl is performing a brand new freestyle tomorrow night (15 August).
“Yes, I do have a little surprise,” he said. “It’s David Bowie – completely not something I’d normally do. It’s a mash-up of his greatest hits, it should be a great crowd-pleaser, banging songs everyone knows.
“I’m hoping that’ll change the way my freestyle looks – I haven’t done it yet, of course. I’m furiously watching a video every day, trying to learn it and get my ear into the music.
“I don’t expect to win a medal – but I expect to do well and go home with a really successful, happy championship and a great score.”
The technical side, as ever, is his own work. “I design [the floorplan] – I always do the technical side of it myself. And Tony Hobden, who does Becky’s music, has designed my new one.”
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Oscar joined Horse & Hound in October 2023 and is the magazine’s dressage editor and sports manager, overseeing coverage of equestrian sport. After studying equine science at Myerscough College, he spent four years working for leading dressage rider Emile Faurie, competing at the 2015 National Dressage Championships and travelling with the yard to CDIs including Aachen and Saumur. He holds a master’s degree in Literature from York St John University (2021).