Elizabeth Taylor did not have to learn from scratch for National Velvet ; she already rode horses as a child, starting at age three. For the film, one source says she was an inexperienced rider who trained before production and was learning at a pace of about one month of progress for every four or five months many new riders would need.

Quick read

So the simplest answer is: around a month of focused training to get where the production needed her, though she had an earlier riding background.

Why the answers vary

  • Some accounts emphasize her lifelong horse love and early riding experience.
  • Others focus on the special preparation she did for the film, which suggests a short but intensive training period.
  • That is why you may see both “she already knew how to ride” and “she learned quickly for the role” in different writeups.

Bottom line

For Black Velvet — usually referring to National Velvet — the best- supported answer is that she needed roughly a month of training for the movie-specific riding work, but she was not a total beginner.

TL;DR: Elizabeth Taylor already had horse experience, and for National Velvet she reportedly learned the needed riding skills in about a month of training.