Keeping Archie Calm in a Busy Warm-up Ring With Multiple Riders

There's a particular flavour of chaos you only find at Australian eventing competitions during spring — horses jog-lopping past each other in a packed warm-up while their riders juggle coffee cups and calculators working out dressage times. The warm-up arena at Boneo Park on a Saturday morning can hold thirty horses at once, with bay Thoroughbreds jostling against stocky warmbloods while someone blasts a Bluetooth speaker near the perimeter boards. Archie, my off-the-track Thoroughbred, used to transform into a coiled spring the moment we stepped over the boards, snorting and throwing his head up at every passing flag.

I've spent the past three years trialling different approaches, watching what the more experienced riders do at One Event rallies and Sydney Three Day comps, and listening to coaches who know the Australian circuit. What works at a quiet EvA80 in the Adelaide Hills is a different recipe than what you need for a CCI at Melbourne International. Here is my strategy for keeping Archie calm in a busy warm-up ring with multiple riders, and the specific tools I reach for when the arena starts to feel crowded.

Why the Warm-up Ring Feels Different to Archie

For Archie, a busy warm-up is sensory overload stacked on top of sensory overload. There are flapping flags on the rails, a commentator squawking over a PA system, plastic bags caught in the wind, photographers stepping backwards with long lenses, and a dozen other horses each with their own energy bubble. From his point of view, every horse that cant past on his inside is a potential threat, and every stride of trot away from us is a possible friend leaving forever. He's a horse who has lost friends before — that's the reality of the racing industry he came from — so his instinct is to call, hollow his back, and pull.

Australian eventing venues often add their own layer of chaos to the mix. At Boneo, the warm-up sits in a hollow with the wind funneling straight through, which means fly spray is a constant requirement and a stray plastic bag can blow across the arena like a phantom. At Wallaby Hill, the ground often gets heavy after morning rain, so horses like Archie who hate deep going start to rush and trip in equal measure. At the Sydney International, the warm-up is bordered by spectator walkways and grandstands, and visitors lean over the rails to wave, which Archie finds genuinely alarming the first few times.

Reading his body language is half the battle. When his ears pin sideways, his tail swishes in short sharp beats, or his stride shortens into a choppy trot, I know the threshold has tipped. Catching those micro-signals before he escalates into a full buck or a spook-and-spin saves the entire warm-up, and arguably the test that follows.

My Pre-Entry Ritual Before We Step In

The warm-up actually starts at the float, not at the gate. I learnt this the hard way after the day Archie refused to load and how we solved it, when I realised that whatever energy he walks off the truck with becomes the energy he carries into the arena. So now, fifteen minutes before I'm due in the ring, I do a slow walk around the float park with him on a loose rein. No plaiting, no brushing, no fuss — just a chance for him to lower his head and roll his tongue.

A loose rein and a lowered head is non-negotiable for Archie. If I lead him up to the warm-up with his neck arched and his jaw braced, I've already lost the first round. I talk to him in a low, steady voice — mostly meaningless babble, the kind you'd have with a mate over a beer at the canteen — and I let him sniff anything he wants to sniff. A bin lid, a wheelbarrow, a kid's backpack. The point isn't the object, it's giving his nose the chance to investigate so his brain doesn't have to interpret everything as a threat.

I also do a short ground-work set in the marshalling area if there's room. Three yield-the-shoulder steps, a backup, a halt-square-walk-on. It gives him a job to think about, and it reminds him that the person at the end of the rope is the source of good things. By the time I'm leading him to the warm-up gate, his pulse is usually sitting around twenty-eight, his eyes are soft, and his lower lip is doing that wobble thing.

The First Five Minutes in the Ring

The moment I swing a leg over in the warm-up, the clock starts ticking on his calm. I never go straight into trot or canter. The first three minutes are always at a free walk on a long rein, working the perimeter of the arena in whatever direction the steward has set. Walking the outside lets Archie clock every horse in the ring without me asking him to engage, and it gives him a sense of place. Horses are claustrophobic about movement they can't see, so the perimeter walk is also a chance to put a face to every spook.

After the free walk, I pick up a working trot on big circles in the quieter corner of the warm-up. I'm not interested in making a beautiful picture in the first five minutes — I'm interested in rhythm. Archie has a default trot that is quick and shallow when he's worried, so I push him forwards into a bigger, lower trot with a half-halt every twelve strides or so. The half-halt isn't a brake, it's a reset button. It tells him, I'm here, I have a plan, follow me.

I avoid the middle of the ring for those first five minutes. The middle is where the fast riders cruise, where someone is always working on a flying change, and where the ground gets churned up first. The corners and the short sides are safer. They're also where the canter transitions feel softer because the ring is narrower, and Archie has less space to build momentum and lose his marbles.

Transitions Are My Best Friend

A busy warm-up is essentially a sensory blender, and transitions are how I get his attention back into the blender and onto me. Trot-walk-trot, walk-canter-walk, trot-canter-trot, halt-trot, trot-halt. Every transition is a question: are you with me, are you listening, are you soft? When Archie answers yes, I let him stretch on a long rein for ten strides. When he answers no, I ask the question again, in a slightly sharper frame.

The canter-walk-canter is the most powerful transition in my warm-up toolkit. A downward transition from canter to walk, balanced and through, requires Archie to use his hindquarters and his brain at the same time. It pulls him off his forehand, it shifts his weight back, and it gives him something to focus on that isn't the bay mare cantering past on his outside. I do at least four or five of these in the first ten minutes, mostly on a twenty-metre circle, and then I can start to actually think about the test.

By the time we're ten minutes into the warm-up, Archie is usually a different horse. His trot has lengthened, his canter has a clearer tempo, and his ears are flicking back to me on the half-halt instead of pinning at the horse across the diagonal. That's the moment I start to school the movements I'll need in the test — leg-yield, shoulder-in, a lengthened trot stride. By the time I walk him to the gate for the call, he's soft, he's responsive, and his breathing is regular.

Reading the Ring Like a Map

Keeping Archie calm isn't only about what I'm doing on top of him — it's about where I'm doing it. A busy warm-up has its own geography, and a good rider treats it like a chessboard. Some pockets of the arena are deathtraps. The spot directly opposite the in-gate is one — horses piling in there, horses piling out there, the stewards shouting, the photographer crouching. The spot near the judges' box is another, because horses always want to stop and stare at the people with clipboards.

I stay away from those spots until Archie is genuinely warmed up and willing. If I find myself in a tight patch with a fast horse bearing down on me, I do a ten-metre circle or a shoulder-in to keep Archie engaged and out of the way. A horse that's working on a circle has a job. A horse that's working on a straight line next to a chaotic gate has a problem. I choose the job.

Body language from other riders matters too. If someone is leaning forward, hauling on the reins, and looking panicked, their horse is about to do something silly, so I give them a horse-length of clearance. If someone is sitting quiet, riding with a long leg and a half-halt, their horse is the kind I'd happily work alongside. After a few seasons, you start to recognise the same faces, the same horses, and the same patterns. Wallaby Hill in May is full of riders who school in the same spots every year for the same reason: those spots work.

When a Hot Horse Rushes Up Behind Us

No matter how good my positioning is, sometimes a hot horse rushes up behind us in canter and Archie loses the plot. When that happens, the worst thing I can do is pull on both reins — that just locks his shoulders, makes him back off his hocks, and primes him for a buck or a bolt. Instead, I push him forwards into a slightly bigger trot, change the direction with a half-halt and an open inside rein, and then bring him back. Forward, redirect, settle. It gives him a job, it uses the energy, and it keeps the rhythm.

If the hot horse behind us is genuinely about to run up our bum, I move to the outside track and slow to a working walk until they've passed. Better a working walk for thirty seconds than a tangled mess of horses, riders, and stirrups. The walk also gives Archie a moment to process what just happened without me asking anything of him. Then, when the coast is clear, I pick up trot again and resume the work.

Some riders swear by staying tight to the rail when things get hairy. I find the opposite works for Archie — staying a metre or two off the rail gives him a buffer and gives me space to do a circle if I need one. The rail is also where the flags are, and flags are Archie's nemesis. A flag on the rail plus a hot horse behind us is a recipe for a spin-and-leap, so I avoid both at once.

The Final Walk and a Recovery Breath

In the last two or three minutes before the test, I always walk on a long rein. I let Archie stretch his topline down, drop his nose, and roll his tongue. I let him have a squeal if he wants one, and I don't tell him off for it. He's telling me he has an opinion about the bay mare cantering past on the other rein, and I'd rather have that squeal now than in the middle of my medium trot in the test arena.

I also use those final minutes for my own recovery breath. Four seconds in, six seconds out, twice through. If I'm tense in my seat, Archie will be tense in his back. If my hands are gripping, his mouth will be gripping. The warm-up isn't only about warming up the horse — it's about warming up the rider, and warming down both at the same time.

Here's a quick comparison of how I adjust the warm-up depending on the size of the ring and the level of chaos in it.

Ring condition	First five minutes	Main work	Final minutes
Quiet EvA80, fewer than ten horses	Free walk, working trot on big circles, canter both ways	Light school of test movements, mostly trot-canter transitions	Long-rein walk, stretch, deep breath for me
Busy One Day Event, twenty-plus horses	Perimeter walk, big circles in the corners, no middle	Trot-walk-trot and walk-canter-walk, four to five reps each way	Long-rein walk on the outside track, slow the breath
CCI warm-up, full field, fast work	Quick walk, working trot, focus on rhythm only	One canter set each way, transitions only	Walk on a long rein, halt, walk on, breathe
Hot afternoon with flies and wind	Minimal walk, straight to trot to avoid being bitten	High-energy trot work to burn off the fizz, then school	Cool-down walk in the shade, rinse mouth, ride to test

The list above isn't a script — every warm-up shifts depending on Archie that day, depending on the weather, depending on how the dressage judge wants the test ridden. But it's a rough map I keep in my back pocket when I swing a leg over, and it helps me make decisions faster when the warm-up arena is heaving. Archie is a creature of habit and a creature of confidence in equal measure. The plan isn't to control every variable — that's impossible at an Australian spring event — it's to give him enough structure that the chaos feels manageable, and enough softness that he knows I'm the steady point in the middle of it.