IN DEPTH WITH... Paul Tapner

A city boy, born and raised in one of the biggest metropolis’ in the world and a foal bought for just £500.

But on Sunday, May 2, 2010, they came together to form a partnership good enough to win the biggest prize in their sport, Badminton.

Inonothing was bought by Jenny Waaler as a weanling foal for just £500 and gained the nickname ‘Spinhead’ for his individual character and his fondness to spin in circles if he got too excited.

However, under the hands of Australian Paul Tapner the duo found a relationship which had them both going in the right direction.

“He was never really thought of as a particularly naturally talented horse, but our sport is very much building up the trust relationship between the rider and the horse,” said Tapner.

“That horse, although he had very limited natural ability in all three phases of our sport, trusted me with his life and I trusted him with mine and by the end of it we could just do amazing things.

“That win at that time in the sport of eventing gave an awful lot of people the enthusiasm for the real reason why we do our sport, that whole trust relationship that you are able to build with your horse.

“Unlike some of the other disciplines, like pure dressage and pure showjumping, you don’t need to buy the very best animal.

“I have got horses on the yard that are hugely naturally talented, but they won’t make it to half the level as Inonothing did because, for the want of a better description, they don’t like me and I don’t like them.

“And it is the same thing the other way. Inonothing in another rider’s hands would probably have never been an event horse, let alone an elite level event horse.

“It is fate that paths of different riders and horses cross in some circumstances and there are plenty of stories like that in our sport.

“It is more about the relationship and the communication between the horse and the rider, so our sport is quite unique in that respect.”

Paul Tapner with horse Kilronan

Growing up in Middle Harbour, Sydney, Tapner had no real connection with the equine world but found himself falling in love with the sport that has played such an important role in his life.

At the age of seven he started at Samarai Park Riding School for an hour every Saturday and by the time he was in the first year of his agricultural science degree at the University of Western Sydney, he knew that he had something special going on, having won club championships, zone championships, state championships and the national championships all in one year.

“It sort of dawned on me that it was a fairly large achievement and that I might be okay at this eventing business,” added Tapner.

“I got halfway through a diploma of education when I realised I was never going to be a school teacher, I never wanted to put myself in that situation, so I dropped out of that and went full-time with the horses because it was a career, and I did have a lot of income happening already at that stage from the horses.

“Then it was just a matter of building up a team of competition horses and trying to find a way to support my eventing habit.”

Tapner came to England in 1999 on an initial five-month contract to ride for Angela Scott at Cirencester, but ended up prolonging his stay.

“The UK is the best eventing circuit in the world,” said Tapner, who won his first British Eventing competiton after making the move.

“If you want to be an eventing rider you have got to have some experience of the UK eventing circuit.

“So that five-month job, riding for the Scott family of Cirencester, was going to give me that.

“The very first British Eventing event I did I won so I thought I was king of the world at that stage.

“It was a very low level event but I was still pretty happy with myself.

“I thought, ‘I can win events in Australia, I can win events in this country’ I am sorted.

"Of course it was a lot harder than that and I wasn’t that delusional to think I had made it.

“I had no intention of staying here, but five months turned into six months, which then turned into three years of me going backwards and forwards from the northern and southern hemispheres, having horses both in Australia and here.

“That then led to less and less commitments in Australia and more and more here.

“So this is now home and whilst I am an eventing rider that will be the case.”

The 39-year-old is now based in Highworth, where it is a family affair at his wife Georgina’s family farm.

The Wickstead Farm Equestrian Centre is actually owned by Tapner’s mother-in-law, who runs her riding school and livery service from there, as well as sharing it with his sister-in-law who has an equestrian business and his brother-in-law with his farrier business.

Georgina, who has two children Joshua and Madison with Paul, has played a key role in the Aussie’s success as she ensures that everything behind the scenes stays in check.

“Georgina has been very instrumental in my career,” explained Tapner.

“She is, what we call, the yard manager but she is really the team manager.

“With the team of 15 competition horses that we have, there is an awful lot of logistics in planning where they are going, dealing with the owners and dealing with all of the people we need to deal with for managing those horses.

“The owner of Kilronan often jokes that the horse gets looked after better than him. The horse has spa treatments, he has his own physiotherapist, he has his own acupuncture and his own chiropractor.

“There is absolutely no stone left unturned in the management of each individual horse.

“There is a huge amount of co-ordination of people and staff to happen around that, which is largely my wife’s job and the idea there is that I can then just focus on riding the horses and doing my job, which is to try and win the competitions.

“The competition here from March through to October means we can literally compete seven days a week with the eventing circuit in this country.

“We choose to do about four days a week on average so it is a very intense lifestyle but something we thoroughly enjoy.”

Now, with his team, Tapner is preparing for the biggest event on the British Eventing calendar this weekend, Badminton.

He will be taking last year’s fourth place finisher Kilronan and Badminton debutant Indian Mill with him to try and secure his second title.

Tapner will feel he has a point to prove after Kilronan led after the first day of dressage last year and held his lead going into the showjumping but failed to clinch the crown on the final day.

“Physically the demands of the cross country had taken their toll far more than I had let on to anybody at the competition because I was still trying to be the competitor and psych everybody out and win,” he revealed.

“We had some fairly hefty problems to deal with on the Saturday night in terms of the physical exertions he had to go through on that day because it was a very physically demanding, as well as a mentally demanding cross country course.

“Unfortunately because of that he didn’t jump to the best of his ability on the last day so we had the four rails down and were back to fourth.

“It was hugely disappointing, but having said that fourth place at Badminton is still a massive achievement.”

Last year’s cross country course has been described as one of the most gruelling cross country tests in the history of the event, as just 35 out of the 77 starting combinations managed to complete Guiseppe Della Chiesa’s layout, and not a single rider managed to finish close to the optimum time.

However, Tapner embraced the challenge and is disappointed that this year’s course, which is set to go in the opposite direction, will not offer the same stern test.

“I thought it was brilliant and I am disappointed this year’s course, in the preview, seems to be a lot softer,” he added.

“I think it was far more that the riders just didn’t appreciate what was set for them by the course designer.

“Time and time again when I watching other riders go around last year I was thinking that they just haven’t got it, they haven’t understood what was required.”

Both horses have had their training tailored since last November around making sure they are at their peak performance come the start of the dressage stage tomorrow.

Tapner, who will be first to tackle the cross-country course this year on Kilronan on Saturday, is full of confidence going into the four-day event, but is wary of a field which boasts 10 horses who have previously won four-star events and eight that have won Badminton.

“Our sport is unique that we don’t compete directly against each other,” said Tapner who has one eye on last year’s winner and fellow Aussie Sam Griffiths.

“My competition can’t influence another’s competition and I don’t feel threatened by anyone, I just feel excited that it is just going to make for a great competition.

“I am going to go out there and do my best and know that everybody else is out there doing their best as well and it just makes for a great competition.

“Having seen my teammate, Sam Griffiths, last year’s winner and Paulank Brockagh in training, it looks so much better than it did last year, so you have got to think that horse is going to be in even better form.

“That horse has a real chance of defending his title. Oliver Townend on Armada has the strategy of riding that horse down perfectly, which he demonstrated last year (finishing third) and has already demonstrated it this season as well.

“Then beyond that it is such a big field of high quality riders and horses.

“Badminton is a four-star event and four-star events can throw up anything at you and that is what makes it a fascinating competition.”

Whatever happens, Tapner will be hoping that, come Sunday, he will be telling another story about a unique partnership.

THE MITSUBISHI MOTORS BADMINTON HORSE TRIALS GET UNDER WAY WITH THE FIRST OF TWO DAYS OF DRESSAGE TOMORROW. LIVE COVERAGE THROUGHOUT THE FOUR DAYS AT SWINDONADVERTISER.CO.UK/SPORT AND IN THE SWINDON ADVERTISER