I'm not sure where to start with my many good things to say about Emily, Katy, and Down Centerline Dressage. I guess I should start with my experience with how Emily find me my horse (a.k.a. the love of my life and my horse of a lifetime) I had recently been thrown off a horse and shattered my wrist, not my finest moment, but Emily helped me turn it into a growing experience. More on that later. So after surgery and being in a cast a couple weeks, Emily tells me I should meet the new horse, Rocky, because I LOVE big horses and he's 16.2. So over to the paddock we go, and he immediately comes up to me and puts his head in my lap and lets me rub all over him. Little did I know that he HATES having his ears touched, he never showed that to me. I fell in love. Over the next two months, Emily was kind enough to pick me up and drive me down to watch her ride, and watch lessons. Learning through osmosis as she called it ;)
Then came the day where she had just had a wonderful training ride on Rocky and asked if I wanted to sit on him and cool him out. DID I? HELL YES I DID! In that moment, the love of that horse far outweighed the fear of falling off. Somehow we managed to get me up, kinda gracefully, into the saddle with only one hand. Emily led me around the arena, and before I knew it I was walking him on my own. All of my sorrows disappeared, I was the happiest girl in the world. That moment not only solidified to me that come hell or high water (and we've gone through both!) I would be figuring out a way to buy that horse. We had an instant bond, and Emily helped facilitate the sale for me and show his previous owners just how much we loved each other. It was seamless. Did I mention that he is not an easy ride? That a beginner such as myself would normally not do well at all on an intermediate ride? Emily immediately saw how his love for me transferred into our riding as well. He took care of me. He patiently stood there for an hour the first time I tried to tack him up by myself (something I look back on now and snort in laughter over!) He navigated me getting my confidence back, we put trust in each other, and have an unspoken understanding.
Ok so now that i'm completely done telling THAT story, it leads me to say this: Emily is an excellent teacher. She really is in tune with each horse and rider and what they need, she customizes each lesson to suit the needs for that day. We all know that we do not get on the same horse every time, even though it's physically the same horse. She also has a wonderful assistant trainer, Katy, whom she has brought on to teach jumping/eventing to riders geared in that direction, or to give them variety in their riding. Katy has the same mix of compassion, passion and drive that Emily brings to the table, with the uncanny ability to tell you you're doing something wrong in a manner that makes you WANT to fix the problem without feeling like you're doing something wrong. My favorite words out of Katy's mouth is "Does that make sense?" A wonderful question to ask any rider. Both Emily and Katy go above and beyond to make sure that their students understand why they're doing what their doing, and go out of their way to explain things we don't understand. They are the dream team of bringing Dressage, Jumping and Cross Country into anyone's life, I highly recommend them. Does that make sense? ;-P read more