Andrew Nicholson at the Badminton Horse Trials last weekend where he finished sixth. Photo / Photosport
Andrew Nicholson at the Badminton Horse Trials last weekend where he finished sixth. Photo / Photosport
The New Zealand rider has won three Olympic and three World Equestrian Games medals since starting out as a groom at Badminton, writes Andrew Alderson.
The first memory of meeting Andrew Nicholson at his 40-acre Wiltshire farm is the hand shake.
A mitt reminiscent of Popeye's is thrust in your direction. The grip suggests no horse under his command gets much free rein.
That's the way it has to be when your sport, equestrianism, is your livelihood. Nicholson's a businessman first, rider second. Few opportunities can afford to escape your grasp.
He and second wife Wiggy set up here 13 years ago, turning a beef farm into one of the more enviable per-capita operations in the equine fraternity. They commissioned the building of stables, a dressage ring, showjumping paddocks for all conditions and, with prizemoney from being the world's No1 rider, an indoor arena. The arena is without lights, so Nicholson wouldn't be tempted to ride more than his staple eight to nine hours a day.
A grooming team of five help them look after 35 horses, which are bought aged two or three from breeders in Spain and then broken in by Nicholson's team before on-selling them.
"He might see a weakness initially," Wiggy Nicholson says of her husband. "It's his job to add value. There is some wastage but you need a ruthless commercial attitude.
"A horse requires a minimum of five years' training to reach four-star level. The flipside is, once they're experienced, their bodies are deteriorating. Part of the skill is managing them as they get older."
An example is 14-year-old Nereo, whose showjumping is under scrutiny after dropping three rails at both Badminton and last year's World Equestrian Games. Those three rails saw his prizemoney at Badminton drop from 80,000 for victory to 17,000 for sixth.
Nicholson, who has been selected for seven Olympic Games, has issues to negotiate with Equestrian Sports New Zealand. They concern an incident at September's World Games in which he admits grabbing vet Ollie Pynn by the lapels and shifting him approximately 4m across a corridor because he was dissatisfied with the monitoring of his horse Nereo, who was on an intravenous drip before the showjumping.
The New Zealand rider prepares his up-and-coming mount Jetset.
However, his omission from ESNZ's high performance squad is only one component to the 53-year-old's daily life.
He came to England with a horse in 1980 and worked as a groom at Badminton for Mark Todd on Southern Comfort. Todd won on his first attempt. Nicholson was hooked.
"I thought, 'this is easy' and, 35 years later, I'm still trying to win it," he grins.
Regardless, eight other four-star titles and three Olympic and three World Equestrian Games medals are indicative of a successful career.
Nicholson lived with the family of Stanley Powell on his arrival in England. Powell had escaped from prisoner of war camps during World War II, returned to England weighing four-and-a-half stone and went on to make a fortune as an agent for products such as toothpaste in Nigeria.
When Nicholson was struggling during his first season, and vowed not to return when he ventured back to the Waikato, Powell encouraged him to persevere. A pivotal moment in his career was completing a full year in the climate.
"I have never been more frozen than back during those February mornings taking the horses out with freezing hands, face and feet," he says. "You knew how to appreciate a sunny, spring day."
The steely eyes, accustomed to making split-second judgements under pressure, twinkle.
We're in the horse lorry on the way to Barbury Castle, an annual eventing venue which gives the impression you're living in a Dick Francis novel. On this occasion, it's where Nicholson and his grooming team put half a dozen horses through galloping endurance training on a synthetic incline.
The horses are saddled, trained and washed before travelling home through the town of Marlborough, all in less than two hours.
Andrew Nicholson. Photo / Andrew Alderson
Such attention to routine and detail has brought Nicholson through the ranks to beat the paradox that you need loyal owners to succeed but need to succeed to find loyal owners.
It might also explain why he was out working on his tractor at 5am on the morning after his Badminton disappointment.
"Owners become family friends," Wiggy says. "He'll discuss decisions with them, because often they're extremely knowledgeable, but the technical decisions are left to Andrew.
"He's ruthless in looking after their interests. He'll always tell them to sell the horse if they get offered good money. That's fundamental to survival in the industry."
Rosemary Barlow and husband Mark have trusted their horses to Nicholson since the 1980s.
"We have only ever had one argument in all that time," she said on ESNZ's website.
Abroken hand in 2011 brought arthritis but Nicholson intends prolonging his competitive career as long as he can. The exhilaration of winning justifies the hours in front of the paddock-length mirror in the home dressage ring, the workouts in the 1000 acres of woodland adjacent to the family property and the jumping practice on the home-built course. It's a key driver when things get tedious travelling overnight to France or Germany or getting delayed at Dover.
For non-four-star events, he now prefers to travel the following day. Equestrianism is not all about the glamour associated with the Badminton and Burghley tweed set.
Yet the scenes at Burghley, where Nicholson has won five times, including the last three, are perfect for ensuring his hands will be on the reins indefinitely.
"It's held at the end of summer, people are enjoying themselves at picnics on the course, and you think, 'this is why we do it'."
