Kaila Simms and Desiree IMP, competing at last month's Dressage by the Sea at Willinga Park. Image by Roger Fitzhardinge.
The emergence of Kaila Simms’ name on the leaderboards recently hasn’t come about by chance – determined and focused, Kaila has steadfastly worked her way up the ranks after a thorough grounding with young horses. Now riding three horses for Anne and Tim Riley, she is really hitting her stride.
Kaila Simms and Totil Desire. Image supplied.
“I look forward to the future with great
excitement and can’t wait to step
up the levels with these horses…”
Kaila Simms was born with a fire in her belly to succeed. Her childhood love of horses, dedication and talent when it came to riding dressage was no passing girlish fad! Serious, fiery, impetuous, passionate, determined and above all always keen to learn, Kaila is also one to help and impart her knowledge to others.
Kaila started from the bottom and worked her way up. Her talent was obvious from when she first started to ride and, as with so many riders who do the hard yards, it was only matter of time until she found her niche. Kaila has now found some very good horses to ride, and great success was had at the recent 4CYTE Dressage by the Sea at Willinga Park.
THE IMPORTANCE OF DRESSAGE
Kaila was born in Canberra. Her mother was a dance teacher running a successful dance studio and her father worked in the quarries. When she was very young, they moved onto a property at Medowie near Newcastle, New South Wales. Her father rode horses, and Kaila started with a pony at Pony Club when she was six years old. She loved the wild side of eventing and show jumping and all she ever wanted to do was be with horses. Just like so many young girls!
Kaila and her first pony, a rig from the RSPCA whom she says bucked her off most rides! Image supplied.
She met up with Anne-Marie Lowry from Byalee Stud around the age of 12 and then spent every weekend with her, her mother dropping her off on Friday afternoon after school and picking her up on Sunday night. She rode many varied and interesting horses and formed her grounding for dressage with Anne-Marie and the Byalee horses. She hated dressage at the beginning but after a while realised the importance of it to all riding!
She became a very competent rider of young horses and showed many at Ryans Horses’ Auction of the Stars. She says it was a great grounding and experience to ride so many different horses with different temperaments and ways of going. She had to learn how to handle the bucking, rearing and bolting experiences that horses set you up with, especially when riding in front of buyers and at auctions. It was a real minefield but one she took on as just another day at the office.
When Kaila finished school, she worked full-time for Anne-Marie for one year. She thought she should do the right thing and go to university so started an equine science degree as she couldn’t cope not being involved in an equestrian career. Her university lasted one year before she decided that it wasn’t for her.
Despite all her experience, it’s amazing to realise that Kaila has had very few horses of her own. When she was 15, she bought a gelding by Byalee Romance when she was working with Anne-Marie and she produced that horse to Advanced and then she sold it when she was at university.
Kaila and Totil Bliss at Dressage by the Sea. Image by Roger Fitzhardinge.
YOUNG HORSE LEARNING CURVE
Kaila saw an advertisement for a position vacant at Nina Boyd’s barn near Canberra and went on to work there with Nina and Steve, who predominantly produced young horses for sale. Kaila relished the opportunity to compete some of these horses, the best of which she thinks was a horse called Cartuso owned by Krysten Lituri. She won championship classes at Small Tour with Cartuso, including at the Canberra Classic where he scored over 70%.
Kaila mainly rode the young horses from just being broken in through to Novice classes to be sold, and also some of the more experienced horses. She had many opportunities to ride with coaches that visited the barn, and on so many different types of horses; it was a great learning curve. It was Anna-Sophie Fiebelkorn from Holland that she found the most interesting and uplifting in the training of horses in general.
Being in a barn with horses for sale, Kaila understood that it was very important that she realised the niche that these horses were to fit into. It wasn’t about training them on a long-term basis to get to Grand Prix. It was making them rideable for the horse that they were at the time for clients to be able to have an enjoyable ride and believe they could take it further in the training.
It was when Anna-Sophie arrived that she was able to start to think a little bit more about the complexities of training towards Grand Prix and the progression of the training. With Anna-Sophie it was all about improving day-to-day and Kaila admits her first few lessons were simply riding around on a long rein getting the feeling for the horse reacting to position and seat, not just the rein. Her overall impression of this training was that there was to be a balance between power and suppleness.
Desiree, pictured here with Kaila at Dressage by the Sea, is now at Small Tour level. Image by Amy-Sue Alston.
Kaila has always wanted to ride with a lot of flash and that’s probably from producing so many young horses, but that was also to keep that energy without being negative and to be able to convert the frame into a supple way of going so both energy and suppleness were most important.
After 3½ years at Nina’s – producing many horses to be better rides and to be higher competition horses in a short period of time that was part and parcel of being in a sale barn – Kaila decided she was ready to start spending more time in producing horses for competition with the view of taking them on as far as she could. Long-term training was in her sights now, rather than short-term training.
It wasn’t long after thinking about moving out for herself that the opportunity to agist, train and run a small business at Anne and Tim Riley’s place just out of Canberra availed itself. Kaila jumped at the opportunity and took a horse of her own there and started taking on a few clients’ horses as well as working with the horses the Rileys had bred.
INTERNATIONAL HORSES
When Kaila moved to the Rileys, she became well sought-after as a young horse rider. Her ability to work with horses that had minor problems – and sometimes major – was a real credit to her and she became well known in the Canberra area for her ability to do just this. As a consequence, she spent a lot of time training and helping other people with young Warmbloods.
Anne and Tim’s daughter Amy was riding a gelding called Misha at Grand Prix at the time as well as Desiree – a Dutch mare imported by the Rileys with the view to also breeding from her. This black mare was very impressive indeed, but green and young at that time. Amy moved overseas with her fiancé, and it was at this stage that Kaila started to ride the mare.
Desiree is by Desperados and a full sister in blood to Toto Jr.’s mother. As a consequence, the mare has been bred three times to Totilas, making the resulting offspring all full brothers in blood to Toto Jr.
The oldest one is a short and sprightly black gelding, Arnage Totil Bliss, who won a Medium test at Willinga Park with 74.097%. Kaila rides him so beautifully and the combination showed great harmony. Totil Bliss is very expressive with a lot of exuberance and is only now starting to come into his own. His younger brother is tall and leggy and a little slower to mature. A very different type but now coming into his own also and doing extremely well and about to start his Medium career with good flying changes and an expressive ground covering canter and plenty of air in the trot.
The second oldest, Totil Desire, has won with scores over 70% from Preliminary right through to his first Medium recently where he scored 72% – and has also scored 83% as a six-year-old in a young horse class. Kaila loves them both, yet they are so different in type and in nature. She says you never know what genetics are going to produce!
The third son has been sold to a good client friend and is almost ready to be broken in. It is time and patience and consistent riding that produces these horses, and Kaila has done all the hard yards having ridden so many young horses and is now able to reap the benefit of all her experience with these two international horses.
Kaila is also now competing Desiree at Prix St Georges and Intermediate 1, and won the national class on her at Willinga. It was her first Inter 1 and she became a little tense in the atmosphere of the big outdoor Grand Prix Arena, spooking at one end. Other than that, the work was quite amazing. She shows super talent, and it will be interesting to watch her career.
Kaila is enjoying the training journey. Image supplied.
MOTHERHOOD CHANGES PERSPECTIVE
The birth of Kaila’s daughter has had an influence on her life that has compelled her to become smarter at time management. As a single mother it creates quite a strain on her business, but she manages well to incorporate it all with the help of the Rileys. Having been used to riding up to 12 horses a day with no limitations as to when and where, time management became vital. Kaila says it was probably a blessing in disguise really as she then took on fewer horses and was able to spend more time producing them the way she wanted to.
Now riding the three horses for the Rileys – Desiree, Totil Bliss and Totil Desire – with great results, she also has several young horses in the barn for training. She has a great name in the area, if not countrywide, for producing young horses in the best way according to their level and timing. She also has a great ability and empathy with riders, so they can come and have lessons on their young horses until they get a really good feel.
Now with more time to compete, especially with the three competition horses, Kaila has every intention of trying her best to get them to Grand Prix. Not having ridden a Grand Prix test at this stage of her life, she’s been able to train horses to produce all the movements of a Grand Prix test. She’s very excited to now have the time to take that next step in her career.
It’s pretty obvious that Kaila’s experience thus far with young horses has put her in a very good position to run a business predominantly in the field that she is expert at (young horses.) Kaila now feels she’s ready for the next step of the journey. Her parents have been totally supportive, basically as Kaila says: “Because there was no turning me around, so if you can’t beat me then you have to join me!” She admits that her early training and dancing through her mother gave her great body awareness and realisation of balance and coordination, all of which are so helpful when it comes to riding dressage.
In asking Kaila what she would like to achieve looking towards her future, she says: “Before I had Kelly, I did envisage myself as going overseas riding, but having my daughter now has put that on hold. Despite this, it is giving me a huge chance to consolidate all the experience of work I’ve had up to this stage with young horses and now pushing forward towards Grand Prix is very, very exciting for me. Staying at home and being able to do these things on a more sensible timeline sees me becoming a better rider, trainer and coach.
“The thought of going overseas and training is not an option at the moment. I love the competition horses I have now, and I love the training. I love all the people that coached me and help me. I’m very appreciative of the huge support team I have around me… my mother, my nan, and the Rileys, to help in the day-to-day planning of my riding. I look forward to the future with great excitement and can’t wait to step up the levels with these horses that I can now spend a lot of time and patience with.”
FEELING FOR CHOREOGRAPHY
On asking Kaila in relation to her test riding, of which she never throws a mark away, was this an innate skill or was it through training, she says: “I think partly it’s something that’s within me. I’ve always thought I had quite a good feel. My feeling for choreography probably helps from my mother’s input and the dance training, so I understand all about movements and putting movements together. I guess it’s something that really comes from within me and I love paying attention to these things.
“As I said before, when I started riding with Anna-Sophie, she really brought this to the fore and it was something I could really focus on as to preparations for movements, balanced corners etcetera. And being someone that loves a task, I really took this on board, and it’s really changed my riding.
“Being a very competitive person – and I believe that was just something I was born with – every opportunity to make myself better in the competition arena I take seriously on board. And being able to ride corners and preparations and exits to movements really is something I love to focus on. Of course, anyone that’s competitive likes to get the edge wherever they can and especially in this sport where it’s such a discipline and requires so much mental control. Having more flamboyant horses now, it’s not only about riding a correct test but I have to listen to what the judges’ comments are, so I know in what way they want me to present the special horses.”
There is no doubt that Kaila Simms has put in the hard yards from those days when she would start at the crack of dawn and go until 9 or 10 o’clock at night. Hard work has never fazed her. To meet Kaila, you realise she is a force. She’s driven to being the best she possibly can and now being tempered in this storm by a family that she has to spend time with as well. She believes it’s made her a much softer and better rider. Not as impetuous. Not in such a hurry.
To watch this rider’s ability is quite incredible and to see her now be able to slow down, take her time and produce horses for herself and her clients to the highest competition level will be very exciting for her and for the sport in Australia in general. She leaves no stone unturned when it comes to her training and her self-discipline, her fitness and her mental attitude. Kaila is going to be a forced to reckon with in the future, especially with these three horses of the Rileys that are all exceptional. Watch this space. EQ
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