Monty Roberts, the renowned "horse whisperer" who bought and sold a dual Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe (G1) winner and became a friend of the late Queen, died Aug. 1 at his farm in California. He was 91.
His famous "join-up" procedure transformed the relationship between horses and humans, and the calming rugs which took his name are a familiar sight wherever an anxious Thoroughbred is reluctant to enter the stalls.
He was also a fine judge of a horse, as he showed at Keeneland, where he paid $40,000 for a yearling who had failed to make his reserve. He sold him for a sale-topping $175,000 the following year, and the horse raced as Alleged, who won the Arc for Vincent O'Brien in 1977-78.
Roberts worked with horses all his life, having started as a child stuntman from the age of 4, and won numerous rodeo competitions. He was sent to Nevada to round up mustangs, and what he learned from those wild horses underpinned the philosophy of his life.
A notable early success in Europe came with the German horse Lomitas, who was so badly behaved on course—notably throwing himself on the ground before the German Two Thousand Guineas (G2)—that he was banned from competition.
After Roberts was called in by stud owner Walther Jacobs, the colt won the Grosser Preis von Berlin (G1), Grosser Preis von Baden (G1) and Preis von Europa (G1) by wide margins, became Germany's Horse of the Year and was officially rated the third-best 3-year-old in Europe.
Ilka Gansera-Leveque, now a trainer based in Newmarket, met Roberts in Baden-Baden at that time and went over to work for him at his farm in the United States for a year.
"The people who worked on the farm, from the riders to the grooms, were some of the best horsemen and I learned a lot," she said. "It was a great grounding, and I had the opportunity to learn from the best.
"He really understood horses, and I learned how to speak to horses non-verbally. He packaged western horsemanship into something for everybody to understand.
"He was a cowboy, a regular, down-to-earth, straight-shooting kind of guy. It was all about the horse for him."
Queen Elizabeth II took an interest in Roberts' methods and invited him to demonstrate his techniques. He also visited Windsor Castle as part of the Queen's Golden Jubilee in 2002 and was appointed a member of the Royal Victorian Order for services to Her Majesty's racing establishment in 2011.
Roberts, whose best-selling autobiography "The Man Who Listens to Horses: The Story of a Real-Life Horse Whisperer" was published in 1996, also worked on 1950s star James Dean's riding skills and stood in for Elizabeth Taylor when she was injured during the filming of National Velvet.
He was a firm opponent of the use of the whip during races and once said: "One day it'll all be whip-free, because we're brighter than that. Whipping a flight animal to make it run faster is stupid. It can't be right."
