Ian Francis (OAM)

As seen in the July 2017 edition of Horse Deals Magazine

In the broad Australian horse world, there would be no better known name than Ian Francis.

A legend in the Western disciplines, Ian is none the less well known in the broader equestrian world and has no doubt solved a few problems amongst the English riding community. Over the past 20 years or so, I have lost count of the well known horsemen interviewed that credit Ian for their success and he has been over the years a mentor to hundreds. He has a busy clinic schedule and gives about 50 clinics a year and is a well respected clinician in the USA. More than just a thinking horseman, he is a thinking person and a great motivator.

A great horseman with feel, timing and balance, Ian was not as one might assume, almost born on a horse. Actively discouraged from horses and rural life, Ian was drawn to it and eagerly sought out associations that enabled him to indulge his passion. Rather than a prodigy on a horse, Ian’s talent is a multi layered thing of experience and hard work. But what set young Ian on the right road and kept him there, was his luck in receiving good advice and his good sense to take it and that allowed his talent to blossom.

Let’s get the lo down from Ian. “I was raised in Maryborough (about 255 kilometres north of Brisbane). My dad came from the rural sector, but did not like it. He was a timber cutter and eventually became a builder. My parents tried very hard to discourage my interest in horses and cattle and the rural sector. That was not their vision for me at all. But ever since I was little, I had a passion for horses and cattle and I made myself very useful to any farmers that lived on the outskirts of town. I spent all my spare time helping them out to be around horses and cattle and that’s how I started getting some experience. When I was about 13 or 14 I tried to work out how to, as people would say, put a handle on a horse. I have always been absorbed in having a very light interaction with horses; that has always been there right from way back. I can remember trying to get them lighter and trying to have a better communication with them. No one at that stage saw any great potential in me; it was just a matter of me getting the response from the horse that I wanted.

“I knew I wasn’t interested in academia and that I wouldn’t have a high paying office or blue collar job, so I kind of knew that if I made myself useful around the local farmers and cattlemen, I’d always have some kind of employment, but my first job in the horse industry did not come til much later on. I was talking about leaving school at 14 and my father got me a job at the local iron foundry. It was a pretty tough place to work, and he asked them to work me hard in the hope that I would lose interest and go back to school. That didn’t work so my parents thought I should get a government job with some security. Like most people brought up during the depression, they thought government jobs were the safest. They talked me in to applying to the Queensland Railway and to my horror, I was accepted. I spent a couple of years there, but I still spent all my weekends and spare time working for people within bicycle riding distance from home, doing whatever was necessary to be involved with horses and cattle. After those two years I left and went bush.

“I didn’t have any notions that I had any particular talent with horses, it was just something I was and have always been drawn to. I cut cane, did fencing and did some mustering when the opportunity arose. About that time I was beginning to ride saddle broncs and steers at the local rodeos, and I became involved with the Whitaker brothers who lived within bicycle riding distance of town. They were rodeo stock contractors to some extent; they had saddle broncs, bulls and teams of working bullocks and traded cattle etc. I spent about seven years with them and got a lot of experience. I was a useful rodeo rider, but I didn’t have a great deal of success; I didn’t have any technique; we just did the best we could.

“There wasn’t an occupation as horse trainer in those days where I lived, unless you were a racehorse trainer. There were horse breakers, but not trainers as such. Barry Whitaker, the eldest of the brothers took a bit of an interest in me and gave me some encouragement. He was also someone who could put a pretty good feel on a horse himself. Mostly I learnt from what other people did but the attitude then was; it took me 30 years to learn what I know, and it will probably take you that long; you will make your own mistakes and you will figure it out maybe. People really didn’t want to tell you and also, I don’t think they were articulate enough to break down the mechanics of it and explain what they did. There was a saying back then; you only get one good horse in a lifetime and a lot of those fellows only got one good horse and it might have become a good horse in spite of them. Everyone got their horse broken in and pretty much trained it themselves. There was nothing like we have today in the way of recreational horse sport back in those days. There was a little bit of campdrafting, jumping and flag racing, that sort of thing. So there was no call for a trainer, the recreational horse trainer came much later on. I never thought of myself as a horse trainer, I thought I was going to be a cattleman. My involvement with horses was using them working with cattle, so I gravitated to getting jobs in the cattle industry as a stockman and working manager on properties in the North Burnett and places like that, and I kept my involvement with horses doing that.

“It was in the early 1970s when I struck a guy called Lee Reborse. He was an American Reined Cowhorse guy who came out here to get involved in the cattle industry. He had quite a bit of success in the US and was well respected there. He was the fellow who really awakened my interest in being a horseman; I consider him my main mentor. About that time, the Western Breeds were starting to make their presence felt here and started to evolve as a leisure industry. I would only take jobs where I could ride my own horses. I would buy an unbroken horse or two, start them, ride them for work and then trade them on and start another and that is how I augmented my income. My transition to virtually full time horse trainer started from that point.

‘What really started me full time in the horse business was the beef depression, (oversupply of stock and plummeting prices) in the 1970s. I had a job working for John Kingston’s, Kingston Rural management doing all the stock work for them. It came to their notice that I got around horses pretty well, but I still hadn’t considered it a full time occupation. When the beef depression hit, John offered me the job of managing his newly formed, Kolora Quarter Horse Stud and that’s what brought me out of cattle and in to the Quarter Horse industry. I took over the training, breeding and management of the place. The job to become a professional horseman scared me to death at the time. But I thought if I was going to be considered a professional horseman I needed to have an extensive range of ability, so I set out to get as much exposure as I could and ride in as many disciplines as I could in order to get a range of experience. My transition all came about because John Kingston told me at that time the horse industry was about to change, and that after the beef depression, the rural sector would not be my market. I never saw the horse industry as a leisure industry, but John pointed out that the average earner had five months of the year free time and a disposable income! He pointed out that there were 52 weekends a year (104 days), 30 days annual leave and about eleven public holidays. He also pointed out that the leisure industry would become the biggest industry in Australia and that horses would become part of that. So I became part of it and eventually a leader in the industry. It was a big turning point in my life. Timing is everything, but it wasn’t me, it was John Kingston who saw the future before anyone else saw it. He said the horse industry at the time was a four billion dollar industry run by amateurs. He said the industry needs some professionalism and he told me that he thought I was the right man for the job. I was aghast; it was way beyond my comprehension that I could be an industry leader, or even cope with it, but I managed to grow with it. John said to me that before I would succeed, I needed to change my attitude, and that has become one of my motivational sayings; if you want to change your life, you just have to change your attitude.”

On training and competition
“I had the idea that if I was going to start a horse for somebody else for a particular discipline, I really should have some idea what the requirements were. That’s what led me to gain as much exposure to as many events as I could. My philosophy as well as a practical necessity then, as now, is to put a good foundation on a horse.

They all need to:
• Go forward, go backwards
• Back up, go left, go right
• Stop, turn left, turn right
• Sidepass left, sidepass right
• And stop, as well as
• Tie up
• Load on a float and
• Be shod.
If I can do all that, it is what I call my foundation and a good place from which to move forward in my training. This foundation gives you a variety of options, if the horse does not suit the particular discipline you are interested in; it gives you more marketing options as it may suit someone else. With all your training, try to make the high pressure areas in to comfort zones.

“What I try to be good at, is to encourage people who show some aptitude or who want to really have a go, that there is a path, there is a way and a thought process that will allow them to grow to success somewhat easier than I did. I get a kick out of being able to do that and I enjoy giving clinics. I have had a lot of experience and a lot of success and I could have chosen to pack up and go home, but I chose to pass that information on. The clinics allow me the opportunity to give back to the industry and it also gives me an income stream. I never considered that I was particularly talented and there was nothing that happened in my early life that led me to think I was. It is said that I have a lot of feel and I think that’s true, but I am not sure if that is something I have inherited or developed. What I do is when I go to a show, I tell myself that:
• I am going to compete against more talented people.
• I am going to compete against people that are better mounted.
But
• I will never go and compete against someone who is better prepared.
I assume I am going to have to work harder than other people and I never go anywhere relying on luck. I think there are more talented riders around than I am, but there are none who work harder or prepare themselves more than I do.

“Feel, timing and balance, along with patience, are the attributes a horse trainer needs. A lot of people talk about feel, timing and balance in a sort of cliché way without actually studying the development of it in depth. I know I have and every day when I ride I work on my sense of feel and my sense of timing and my imagination. When out riding, use the natural environment as training tools and be aware of the opportunities that are around you; that’s what I mean by imagination.

“I try to be the best clinician I can be and I tell students; don’t worry about what’s ahead, just go as far as you can. From there you can see a lot further.”

Ian Francis gives clinics throughout Australia for most of the year. Don’t think they are just for Quarter Horses, they are for all horses. Anyone who saw Ian ride Mary Hanna’s Warmblood stallion, Shiraz Black at Equitana a few years ago understands that Ian is not just a cowboy. He has a number of books and DVD’s available that are sure to include some advice on your particular horse problem, despite how unique you think it is.

Ian’s Achievements:
• Five times NRHA Futurity Champion
• Five times NRHA Futurity Reserve Champion
• Four times NRHA Derby Champion
• Five times NRHA Derby Reserve Champion
• Equitana Asia-Pacific Reining Masters Champion
• International Reining Council Open World Cup Champion
• Three times NCHA Futurity Champion
• Three times NCHA Futurity Reserve Champion
• NCHA Derby Champion
• Four times Reined Cowhorse Futurity Champion
• Seven times Reined Cowhorse Futurity Reserve Champion
• Two times Cloncurry Stockman’s Challenge Champion
• More than fifty Australian Championships in Halter, Trail, Cutting, Reining, Working Cowhorse and Western Riding
• AQHA and NCHA Hall of Fame Inductee
• Reining Australia Hall of Fame Inductee
• Furlong Stud (QLD) Equine Hall of Fame Inductee
• Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) for Services to the Equine Industry as a trainer, breeder and competitor.

Written By: Anna Sharpley.

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