CLYDESDALES were once a common sight in rural Australia, but it is becoming increasingly rare to see them at work on the farm or a team of them pulling a heavily laden trolley on the road.
It is even more unusual to see a woman as the driver of such a team, but not at Mil-Lel, where Lynette Fritsch is steadily but surely making a name for herself with her Lowanvale Clydesdale Stud.
She is also developing a reputation as an excellent trainer of harness horses.
So much so that when it came time for Coopers Brewery to commission someone to break-in a new team-of-four, longtime brewery Clydesdale manager Mike Keogh decided to ask Lynette to do the job.
"We had to make a decision to put a new team together," Mike said.
"The previous team was getting-on in age so 12 months ago I asked if Lynette would be interested in getting them going.
"So far as I know, no other woman has broken in a four-horse Clydesdale team."
Training four geldings that tip the scales at anywhere from 600 kilograms to 700kg at four years old and stand 17 hands high at the shoulder, is no easy job.
And with the Coopers Brewery celebrating 150 years of brewing this year, the new team also had to be prepped and ready for a full year of promotional events and shows ? no easy task for four freshly broken draught horses.
The task was made harder as usually one youngster is placed in a team with older, more experienced horses, but this could not be done because the previous team-of-four had been retired.
"It's very unusual," Mike said.
"You usually always bring in young horses with old horses."
Mike said that after Lynette had the four horses working well and pulling a sled, they were driven in teams of two, before being slowly introduced to being worked as a team of four.
"At Christmas I picked up the last two horses, then I had 2.5 months to get them to the Sydney Royal Easter Show," he said.
In April, less than three months after being broken to harness, the four ? Coopers Jacob, Coopers Max, Coopers Bill and Coopers Edward ? went on to win the prestigious supreme champion multiple-horse business turnout at the show.
It was an amazing success for the team's first Royal show ? a result Mike says was testament to Lynette's thoroughness and ability in breaking them in.
"I'm really indebted to what she did," Mike said.
"The horses did not put a foot wrong and we had a great show and great success."
The team was placed first in the single-horse tradesman turnout, second in the pair of tradesman turnout and first in the three-horse (unicorn) tradesman turnout.
"We were initially reluctant to enter the four-horse team, because Coopers Max had not settled," Mike said.
"We took him out and walked him down Parramatta Road near the showgrounds and at the eleventh hour he settled and we were able to enter the class."
While Coopers used to own up to 200 horses, these days only Mike's team of four are contracted to the brewery.
Manager of the brewery Clydesdales for the past 24 years, Mike says that driving a team-of-four heavy horses has become a dying art.
"I'm the only one left doing promotional work ? and deliveries ? at least once a week in Adelaide," he said.
"The horses are very popular and the brewery is always getting people ringing up and asking for appearances.
"But teams and team driving is definitely a dying art."
He thanked those behind the scenes ? his wife Liz Murphy, blacksmith Tim Peel, Wagga Wagga, New South Wales, harness-maker Mark Porter, Wagga Wagga, plus farrier Graham Ferris, Balaklava, and Lynette's husband Ian ? the "ultimate mechanic" for their invaluable support.
The backing of the Coopers family, who own the brewery, was also vital.
"In the 1950s to mid-1960s the brewery did not use any horses," Mike said.
"It was Coopers Brewery chief executive officer at the time, Bill Cooper, who wanted to put a team together again to promote the brewery, which is how I got involved.
"The current chairman and marketing director Glenn Cooper is the one keen to support the horses now. He has been known to come and help muck-out stables and pick up manure ? something that we never let him forget!"
Besides helping Mike, Lynette also shows her own Clydesdales, and they plan to compete against each other at the Royal Adelaide Show in September.
Mike says they will both be out to win.
"There will be no friendships in the ring," he joked.
"I'm really looking forward to the future and seeing how great this team becomes."
A former Victorian, Lynette said she only became interested in Clydesdales after watching the Carlton United Clydesdale team ? a long time rival to the Coopers Clydesdales team ? compete in shows.
"I was brought up with ponies, and rode at pony club," she said.
"My father, Ian Dorrington, used to drive a pony to school and my mum, Elaine, also used to ride a horse to school and compete in showing."
But it was not until 1990 that she bought her first Clydesdale.
"I'm only just getting into driving a team-of-four," she said.
"I own two horses and another friend, Chris and Leigh Sutherland, also own a pair that we plan to combine and compete as a team of four at the Adelaide Royal."
Three of the four horses were broken-in by Lynette, and she is confident of doing well at the Adelaide Royal.
She said she was also very proud of the Coopers Clydesdale team doing so well at the Royal Sydney Easter Show.
"It was incredible," she said.
"I felt like I'd won as well."
