Day 4!!

Our first day in Denmark was wonderful! We arrived at Morten Thomsen’s barn at 9:30 a.m. excited to meet the man famous for his in hand work and ability to train piaffe and passage to any horse. 

We were greeted by Sarah, Morten’s wife who was extremely friendly. She took us through the barn to the indoor ring to meet Morten who was working with a horse.  We talked for a bit and then Sarah gave us a tour of the barn. It was a gorgeous brick barn with room for 31 horses. After the tour, we returned back to the ring where Morten had a wonderful day planned to show us the progression of training. He showed us how he teaches horses at each stage of training, from 3 years old to Grand Prix.

 Morten is a phenomenal communicator and teacher. At the end of the day it was obvious why he is asked to teach clinics all over the world. Morten’s philosophy is that “Our goal should be Grand Prix. That should always be in our minds as we train.” He talked a lot about teaching horses, and not keeping them in the dark. From day one of training they are taught how to answer what is being asked of them, without being punished for making a mistake. It was very apparent that Morten really understands horses, and he really loves teaching them.


During one discussion in the room overlooking the indoor ring, he stated that “We as trainers should be the teacher, and the horse is the pupil”. He went on to say how horses cannot speak our language and they cannot learn how to piaffe by watching another horse. The only way that they can learn is if we teach them in a way that they understand. He used the example of  how dogs learn tricks through “positive reinforcement”, such as getting a treat when they learn to sit. Horses however, cannot learn collection by being fed treats. They are taught these things through “negative reinforcement”, which should never be abusive at all. Negative reinforcement is teaching the horse that when he yields to pressure, the pressure is released.

The first horse we watched Morten work with was a 5 year old bay gelding. He demonstrated how he would start working with a normal 3 year old in hand prior to backing. He said that one of the first lessons these young horses learn takes place in their box, where they are taught how to lift and hold each leg at the light touch of a bamboo stick. The horse was in a western rope halter with a long cotton lead rope, looking anxiously around. Morten stood in front in front of the horse at first, and then moved around from side to side until the horse would turn and face him. The first thing he said was that “you must have the attention of both eyes and ears of the horse.  Then once he had the horses’ attention, he moved the horse all over the arena sideways, backwards, and forwards. 

 With the rope halter, Morten taught the horse to lower its head and keep it there while standing quietly. This taught the horse to give to pressure without fighting. He said that you must “teach him to yield from pressure of all kinds, and then in any scary situation they must stand still.” Morten stressed the importance of not punishing the horse if it makes a mistake because the horse must figure out the answer on his own. If you punish the horse every time it makes an honest mistake, you are basically training him to be afraid of trying. At the beginning, the most important thing is that the horse tries.

From there, Morten worked on teaching the horse how it should react when it’s frightened. First, he took a piaffe whip with a scary plastic bag tied to the end and waved it all around.  As soon as the horse lowered its head, Morten stopped the bag waving. So the horse learned that if it lowered its head and stood still, the scary noise went away. Then Morten took an awfully loud hand clapper and held it near the horse. When the horse lowered his head, the noise stopped. Then he touched the horse all over its back and neck with the scary noise maker until the horse ignored it.


At 3 years old, the young horses are introduced to the bridle and are immediately taught to yield to the bit, leg yield, shoulder-in, and travers from the ground. Morten explained that this is how the horse can be taught to understand the aids from the ground, that way it has an idea of how it should respond.  Morten made an analogy of good teachers and bad teachers. If the teacher asks its student a question, and the student is punished every time it answers wrong, then pretty soon the student will stop trying to answer. But, if the student is encouraged to answer even if it gets it wrong, then he will keep trying. Then once he gets an answer right and is rewarded, he will try even harder. Morton is a good teacher, and he does his best to explain things step by step to his horses until they understand him. Morten believes that in order to teach piaffe and passage, the horse must understand how to lift its legs separately. Morten takes the lessons of lifting the leg in the box for the hoof pick, to the next step by teach the four year old horse how to lift and hold the leg underneath its body and forward.


Once this is confirmed, Morten begins teaching the 4-year-olds Spanish walk. This Is to teach the horse how to lift each leg independently, this gives the rider the ability to fine tune their aids so that they can ask more from either the hind legs or the front legs. Then, the horse is taught how to switch legs quickly behind. The horses are taught to quickly jump from one hind leg to the next. The next step is to let the horse go a little more forward, which evolves into half steps.

After the first horse, Morten showed us several other horses that had been trained like this as 3 and 4 year olds, and it was interesting to see how well these horses responded. The thing that stood out about Morten’s training was that all of his horses were pretty much relaxed, confident and trusted their riders.  This is because Morten takes as much time as needed to let the horses develop happily. All of the in hand work is introduced like a game, and the horses are never mistreated in anyway. Once they figure out what is being asked of them, they seemed very happy to try even harder.

Morten talked about how too many people do not even start to train the piaffe and passage until their horses are almost to Grand Prix, which Morten says is a mistake because then the horses are rushed too much.  Instead, Morten prefers to approach these difficult movements like a game. He introduces the beginning lessons of piaffe to all of his 4-year-olds, and returns to it throughout their training until they are ready for Grand Prix.  He said that “Lifting the legs is like teaching flying changes. You don’t expect the horse to know how to do the tempi changes just because they can do a single change.”

It was a lovely day in Denmark for sure! Morten and his wife Sarah really went out of their way to make us feel welcome and help us understand their training system. Day 4 of the Olympic Dream Program gave our group a lot to walk away with!

Eiren Crawford and her FEI mare "Countess"

The biggest black 2-year-old I've ever seen!! This guys is already over 17hh!