United States Eventing Association

A Look Into The German Young Event Horse Program with Ashley Kehoe

The Young and Future Event Horse article series is being provided through a partnership between Mythic Landing Enterprises, LLC., and the USEA.

Ashley Kehoe is an experienced upper level rider who has campaigned in the United States through the CCI3* level while working and learning under some of the most respected names in the sport. For the past four years Kehoe has worked with young horses professionally for Debbie Adams, Sharon White and most recently, Michael and Nathalie Pollard. Kehoe’s dream was to always ride, train and compete overseas, and she is now based in Germany with top young horse selector and producer, Philipp Kolossa. It is no secret that Europe, especially Germany, has a proven formula for producing successful Event horses, and her experience has shed light on this process.

Learning under Kolossa has not only improved Kehoe’s riding and training techniques, but she’s also learned what formula goes into selecting a top sport horse. “Philipp’s ideal horse is ¾ Thoroughbred and ¼ Warmblood. He tries to find horses that have really good bloodlines along with Thoroughbred blood. With so many breeders in such a small radius, there are so many breeding farms that Philipp can go to in a day to check out the new crops of young horses. In the U.S. they are far more spread out, making it difficult for selectors to look at a wide variety of horses at once.” Kehoe explains.

Once Kolossa selects what he believes is a talented young horse, they are essentially a blank canvas. Kehoe said, "Philipp will bring the horses into the barn to start them in our training program when they are comfortable with a rider on the flat and at least four years old. We start with cavaletti work and free jumping—a process a little different than the United States.” Kehoe explains that in Europe, trainers want to make sure that the young horses want to jump and have a willingness to get to the other side as that will help them move forward in their training. "We do a lot of free jumping with the youngsters, varying the gymnastic to get them to improve their footwork and focus on the fences. We want the young horses to be able to take care of themselves over a fence, right from the beginning, without the help of the rider, " Kehoe added.

Once a bit of training is put on the horse, Kehoe soon starts taking the horses to shows. “Germans are very serious about their Young Event Horse competitions. They start early with a lot of little jumper and dressage shows. Every weekend in the summer there are three or four shows very close to Philipp’s and they all have a lot of atmosphere! Almost every horse trials in Germany offers young horse classes for the four through six year olds. There are so many opportunities for the young horses to get their feet wet as they are competing on a very consistent basis, whether it be a full horse trials or just a small jumper or dressage show,” Kehoe said.

Germany offers so many opportunities for these young horses to gain mileage and exposure, while the U.S. is much larger so the opportunities are often spread out. “In the U.S. it’s so hard to get the young horses qualified for the [Young Event Horse (YEH)] championship because [in some areas] there aren’t many horse trials that offer the YEH classes. I remember I had to drive 10 hours just to get my horse qualified for the championships!” Kehoe continues, “In Germany, all of the horse trials allow you to do either the full horse trials or just the cross-country portion. If you just do the cross-country course, you’re allowed to walk around the entire course on your horse first to let them see all the jumps. This is no brainer in Germany, which I think is genius. It’s all about building confidence.”

All of these small competitions allow riders to qualify to compete at the Bundeschampionat, which is Germany’s Young Event Horse Championships. The format is much different than here in the United States. Kehoe explains, “The Bundeschampionat is very serious, with about 30-50 five and six year olds competing. The five year olds are doing Training level and the six year olds are jumping Preliminary height questions.”

The competition includes four days of intense competition where you must obtain a qualifying score in order to progress to the next phase. This begins with cross-country on the first day. “Right off the bat, they want to see how these horses jump, which is most important if any of the horses are going to reach the highest level,” Kehoe mentioned. The top ten horses automatically move onto the next phase of competition, but those who scored outside of the top ten ride cross-country again on the second day of competition for another chance to impress the judges and achieve a qualifying score. The third day is comprised of show jumping and dressage, where again you have to achieve a qualifying score to progress to the final day of competition, which is another cross-country course, this time one level higher. For 5-year-old horses it would be Preliminary course and an Intermediate course for 6-year-old horses.

Kehoe elaborated on the intense nature of this championship, “This competition as a whole is very intense, and isn’t favored by some riders, as it is set up to be a test, more than building a horse's confidence. Many top riders, including Philipp chose not to run their best young horses at the Bundeschampionat. They see it dominated by pure Warmbloods, who sell for big price tags, but may never make it to the top levels. Even Michael Jung on [La Biosthetique Sam] was second-to-last when he competed him [in the Bundeschampionat].” Although not all riders compete in this championship, some return yearly. “Other riders figure that if a young horse can handle the atmosphere and come out on the final day still trying for you, then they have the potential to be great,” Ashley added. "You can see how in Germany they really stress the cross-country.”

Stay tuned for Part 2 of our interview with Ashley as we go into discussing German training techniques for young horses.