At home, in the stable he rents at Domaine de Grosbois, trainer and driver Franck Ouvrie, second in the 2020 American Grand Prix with Davidson du Pont, kindly agreed to share his daily life at CNEWS.
With its more than 400 hectares, the Domaine de Grosbois, at the gates of Paris, is a unique place in the inner suburbs …
It is an incredible place which allows us, during the four months of the Vincennes winter meeting (during which the majority of the most prestigious trotting races take place, including the Grand Prix d’Amérique / Legend Race) to benefit from professional infrastructures, including a veterinary clinic as well as quality tracks, to maintain and train our horses. In addition, even if I am a Northerner, most of the players in the horse racing world are from the west of France (Normandy, Mayenne, Sarthe). The possibility of experiencing winter a few kilometers from the Vincennes racecourse gives us invaluable time savings and saves us countless trips back and forth between Paris and the provinces.
What is your background ?
It was a bit by chance, after having come across a small ad in Cheval magazine, that I joined the Graignes driving school. At the time, I was 14 years old and I was also reluctant to enroll in sports-studies athletics section. I then apprenticed with Jean-Pierre Dubois before becoming a professional. For about fifteen years, I have made the choice to embark, in addition, in a coaching career. In all, about twenty horses are placed under my responsibility. It is an average structure which allows me to have time to free myself in order to drive the horses of other trainers.
What are your days like?
Currently, they are well filled. At 6 am, we start treating the 14 horses that I train in the winter at Grosbois. At 7:30 am, we are on the track to start training. At the very end of the morning, we set off for the Vincennes racecourse where most of the meetings take place in the early and late afternoon. We have established with my team a protocol which consists of training the horses every two days. The closer to the end of the race, the more we intensify the content of the sessions.
How do you train a racehorse?
The methods have evolved a lot. Previously, each horse did 3,000m rope on the right then 3,000m rope on the left and the session was over. All that has changed a lot and we are now inspired by athletic methods with a lot of work in intervals over 750 to 1000m, at an intense pace, on tracks with elevation gain.
Tell us about Davidson du Pont …
Since the start of my career, I have never had a better horse. It was Jean-Yves Rayon, for whom I was racing five and a half years ago, who gave him to me one winter to train him. I then led him for his debut at La Capelle (2e in March 2016), then he had a series of good results. The horse’s 4 year anniversary coincided with the retirement of Jean-Yves Rayon. The latter then placed Davidson at Jean-Michel Bazire, telling him: “if one day you do not drive him, I would like you to entrust him to Franck”. That’s how I finished second in the 2020 American Grand Prix, Jean-Michel having chosen that year to be on Belina Josselyn’s sulky.
The trot is not a natural gait in the horse. Is it easy to instill it?
Between breaking in and qualifying to have the right to compete in the races, there is about a year of work. We proceed gradually, starting with flexible work with the sulky. Some horses adapt easily to the team, others less.
Then, little by little, the horse is accustomed to accepting the various devices available (shoeing, training, etc.). I bring out my foals alongside a more experienced horse in charge of putting the pace in the group. Since the proliferation of Franco-American crosses in the 90s, the Trotteur Français breed has “stabilized”. We now see that young horses trot almost soon after birth and easily understand what they are taught. This is the case of the greatest cracks like Timoko, Ready Cash, Face Time Bourbon or even Billie de Montfort, impressive in longevity.
