Benefits of the Therapeutic Approach

Ideally, in every session, we should strive to improve the horse's physical, mental, and emotional well-being.

To achieve this, we need to consider ourselves a mix of physiotherapists, personal trainers, psychologists, teachers, and friends. Throw in a healthy dash of compassion, education, and understanding, and you're well on your way to a successful relationship.

As physiotherapists, we gently manipulate the body, loosening tension and stretching, allowing the best freedom and range of motion and lessening pain and discomfort. We try to remediate impairments and promote mobility and function. We also take the whole horse into consideration (from properly balanced hooves to possible muscular or skeletal blocks) to ensure that the horse is able to perform what we ask of him.

As personal trainers, we set a training schedule that works with the body, conditioning the horse's cardiovascular fitness in stages while building strong, healthy muscle tone to properly support joints, bones, ligaments and tendons. We slowly increase work-load and demands to ensure optimum health and prevent injuries, never pushing the body past its limits.

As psychologists and teachers, we understand the horse's mind and never over-challenge it. We set guidelines for proper behavior without brutality. As compassionate trainers and riders, we realize that the horse is a living being, with feelings and emotions of his own. We want to encourage and support, to ask for cooperation, rather than forcing the horse to submit.We understand the benefits of a caring, loving relationship and that horses have a need for a partner they can trust - not just in situations, but also with their physical and emotional comfort and well-being.

If we approach training with this in mind, we help horses enjoy and look forward to working. In short, the Therapeutic Approach:

• Builds strong muscle tone that acts like a shock-absorber, decreasing stress on joints and bones
• Increases range and freedom of motion
• Reduces injury potential and wear and tear
• Improves performance, movement, strength, endurance, jumping ability, rideability, and cooperation
• Relieves physical and mental tension
• Reduces stress
• Creates happy, proud, confident horses
• Encourages horses and enhances willingness to perform
• Builds lasting partnerships and friendships between horse and rider
• Keeps fun and joy in riding for horses and riders
• Empowers owners through education