Willow Grove Ranch

08/01/2026

I love helping you with you and your horses education and wellness! But it is very tiring for me as an introvert. I didn’t know there were others like me but this explains the introverted horse trainer.

We want to help! But we can seem a bit distant at times.

WHY SOME OF THE BEST HORSE TRAINERS SEEM DISTANT...

It isn't that your horse trainer doesn't like you.

Some of the best trainers and competitors in the horse industry are introverts. For many of us, that's how our connection with horses started in the first place.

While a lot of people grew up learning how to fit in, seek approval, and they learned how to thrive in crowds... many of the future trainers found peace in a barn, a pasture, or on the back of a horse. Horses became the place where life made sense to them.

The truth is... Most trainers don't get burned out from training horses. They get burned out from people.

They get burned out on the nonstop constant phone calls. The messages. The expectations. The pressure. The difficult conversations. The emotional weight that comes with serving the public.

And those competitors who sometimes seem stuck-up? Many of them aren't arrogant at all. They're simply people who recharge in solitude instead of crowds.

The trainers and competitors who stay in this industry for years usually learn how to manage that part of themselves. They learn when to socialize, when to serve, and when they need to step away long enough to reset.

So if your trainer goes quiet for a while... or that competitor you've always admired disappears for a few days...

Don't automatically assume they're upset with you. They may simply be doing what they have to do to protect their own mental energy so they can come back and give their best to their horses, their clients, and the people who depend on them.

This is a topic that barely gets talked about at all in our industry...

So here's an honest question for y'all. ..

How many of you are introverts, and how many of you feel more drained by people than by spending a full day with horses?

📸 Jared H Searcy reelcowboy

08/01/2026

Lots of agreement here.

“I asked for a plan for my HORSE’S movement, not mine. It’s the horse that needs rehab, not me.”

A student said this to me after receiving feedback on her riding.

Her horse was hollow, crooked, and struggling to carry himself well. She had expected a list of exercises for the horse—a rehabilitation program to strengthen his body and improve his way of going. Instead, much of our conversation revolved around her: her balance, her posture, her awareness, and the way she organized her own body in the saddle.

She was surprised.

Like many riders, she viewed herself as the instructor and the horse as the student. From her perspective, the horse was the one with the physical deficits, so surely the horse was the one who needed the exercises.

The problem is that a horse cannot separate their movement from the person sitting on their back.

Our bodies become part of their biomechanics.

Every shift in our pelvis changes how the horse uses their back. Every collapse through one side of our torso influences how they load a limb. Every moment we brace, grip, lean, or become asymmetrical changes the information the horse receives about balance, direction, and weight.

In other words, rider and horse become a single athletic system. One cannot move independently of the other.

This is why any rehabilitation or gymnastic program is only as effective as the rider’s ability to perform it.

Shoulder-in, for example, is a brilliant exercise for improving lateral suppleness, engagement, and straightness—but only when it is ridden correctly. If the rider overbends the neck, collapses a hip, drives with the seat, or blocks the horse’s back with tension, the exercise no longer develops the horse as intended. It simply rehearses poor movement under a different name.

The exercise itself is not therapeutic.

The quality with which it is ridden is.

This is why the conscientious rider learns to balance themselves, control themselves, and understand themselves before asking the horse to do the same.

They understand that horses cannot separate our influence from their own movement. Every aid, every posture, every habit becomes part of the environment in which the horse learns to carry themselves.

The goal, then, is not simply to find better exercises. It is to become a better influence.

Because a horse can only move as well as the conversation we create with them allows.

In the end, horsemanship is not simply the education of the horse. It is the continual education of the rider.

07/31/2026

As one who makes them…I say yep

Yep!

07/31/2026

Jamey wore a GoPro for the marathon at Inavale! A great way to experience this part of a CDE!

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

07/30/2026

Here is a walkthrough video of some of the marathon obstacles. During the marathon phase of combined driving, you drive through the woods or the fields, whatever the location has, and about every kilometer you cover, you will have an obstacle to drive through in letter order. There's more to it but that's a quick summary.