Black In The Saddle

Imagine growing up in Lexington, Kentucky, but never touching a horses. Now imagine getting a call from the city's tourism board asking whether you can make sneakers for them. Marcus Floyd said yes before he knew what that meant. Four months later, Horse Kicks went globally viral, Nike's lawyers came calling, his Instagram was deleted overnight. Despite all of this, a door opened to the equestrian world that he's been walking through ever since.

Marcus is the artist behind Infinite Customs and Horse Kicks, with custom work for the cast of Power, Nelly, Coach K's Nike retirement send-off, and Luka Dončić through an approved Jordan Brand collab. We get into how he built the first prototypes on a medicine boot, why he partnered with Equine Fusion to make his mass-produced design safe before making it stylish, what it takes for an outsider to earn trust with horse people, and what he learned only this year about his grandfather's work as a groom. We also talk Paris Fashion Week, the Black cowboy moment in mainstream culture, a dream Disney collab, and his new podcast, Bad Mares Club.

Mentioned in this episode

• Horse Kicks (@horse.kicks) and Infinite Customs (@marcus_floyd_infinite)
• Horse Kicks website: www.horsekickslex.com
• Visit Lex and the 2022 Breeders' Cup campaign
• Equine Fusion (manufacturing partner)
• Bad Mares Club podcast

Connect with Marcus on Instagram at @horse.kicks and @marcus_floyd_infinite

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to like and subscribe! It helps get the podcast out to new listeners. I mean, while you're at it you should share it with a friend! I'm sure they'll enjoy this episode as much as you did.

Join Us at Kinship Conference

Mark your calendar: November 6–7, 2026 in Greensboro, NC.

Kinship is a two-day gathering for Black horse folks across every discipline. The FIRST event of its kind, Kinship is built on connection, mentorship, skill-sharing, and honoring the stories that shaped us. If you're looking for real community and real pathways forward in the horse industry, this is where you belong.

✨ Grab your ticket(s) TODAY: https://www.blkinthesaddle.com/kinship

Let's Keep in Touch:
Support the podcast on Patreon→ @blackinthesaddle
Join the newsletter to be the first to know EVERYTHING BITS : https://blkinthesaddle.kit.com/3e1170...
Follow Black In the Saddle on Instagram @blkinthesaddle
Follow Abriana on Instagram @theabrianaj

Advertising Disclosure
Some links or mentions in this episode may be promotional or include affiliate partnerships. We only share what aligns with the values of Black in the Saddle and serves our community.

Narsis Whigham grew up in Chicago and learned horses on his family's 125-acre farm in Mississippi, riding the bus south by himself as a teenager to get back to the barn. A Batesville couple who bred spotted Tennessee Walking Horses put him on his first true walking horse, and that ride set the path. Today he trains, shows, judges, and works in equine-assisted services at Mississippi State.

In this episode, Narsis explains what a gaited horse really is and why once you ride a well trained mount, you'll never go back. He talks about learning to judge by chasing down judges after his own classes, why he places the horse and not the rider, prioritizing rear-end engagement in a ring built around front-end action. He also gives an insider's read on where the walking horse industry stands now: field trial horses selling for five figures, growth in flat-shod classes, the return of padded horses, and an industry that knows it has a PR problem.

Mentioned in this episode:

• Tennessee Walking Horses, spotted walking horses, and racking horses
• Field trials as a growing market for walking horses
• Trail pleasure and country pleasure (flat-shod) classes
• Equine Assisted Services at Mississippi State

Connect with Narsis at The Walking W on Facebook and @thewalkingw_r2t on Instagram and TikTok

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to like and subscribe! It helps get the podcast out to new listeners. I mean, while you're at it you should share it with a friend! I'm sure they'll enjoy this episode as much as you did.

Join Us at Kinship Conference

Mark your calendar: November 6–7, 2026 in Greensboro, NC.

Kinship is a two-day gathering for Black horse folks across every discipline. The FIRST event of its kind, Kinship is built on connection, mentorship, skill-sharing, and honoring the stories that shaped us. If you're looking for real community and real pathways forward in the horse industry, this is where you belong.

✨ Grab your ticket(s) TODAY: https://www.blkinthesaddle.com/kinship

Let's Keep in Touch:
Support the podcast on Patreon→ @blackinthesaddle
Join the newsletter to be the first to know EVERYTHING BITS : https://blkinthesaddle.kit.com/3e1170...
Follow Black In the Saddle on Instagram @blkinthesaddle
Follow Abriana on Instagram @theabrianaj

Advertising Disclosure
Some links or mentions in this episode may be promotional or include affiliate partnerships. We only share what aligns with the values of Black in the Saddle and serves our community.

Preshuslee Thompson came to horses with no background, no gear budget, and no one in the barn who looked like her. Six years later she's an equine-assisted psychotherapist who can name the shift from calling herself "green" to handling horses with confidence and supporting clients thorough that same transition.

Abriana and Preshuslee met at a HERD Institute conference, and this conversation picks up where her session left off. She walks through her work as a clinical and occupational social worker, her path from implicit bias research to trauma-informed care, and the session with two mares, Heidi and Joy, that finally let her answer one question honestly. They also dig into cultural humility, who gets credit for experiential knowledge, and why belonging to yourself is how you belong anywhere, including in a horse world that doesn't always make room.

Preshuslee is speaking at the Kinship Conference, November 6–7 in Greensboro, North Carolina.

Mentioned in this episode

• HERD Institute and Dr. Veronica Lac
• Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity
• EAGALA model of equine-assisted psychotherapy
• Cultural humility framework
• Kinship Conference, November 6–7, 2026, Greensboro, NC

Connect with Preshuslee Thompson on LinkedIn and with Preseli Equity Consulting Group

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to like and subscribe! It helps get the podcast out to new listeners. I mean, while you're at it you should share it with a friend! I'm sure they'll enjoy this episode as much as you did.

Join Us at Kinship Conference

Mark your calendar: November 6–7, 2026 in Greensboro, NC.

Kinship is a two-day gathering for Black horse folks across every discipline. The FIRST event of its kind, Kinship is built on connection, mentorship, skill-sharing, and honoring the stories that shaped us. If you're looking for real community and real pathways forward in the horse industry, this is where you belong.

✨ Grab your ticket(s) TODAY: https://www.blkinthesaddle.com/kinship

Let's Keep in Touch:
Support the podcast on Patreon→ @blackinthesaddle
Join the newsletter to be the first to know EVERYTHING BITS : https://blkinthesaddle.kit.com/3e1170...
Follow Black In the Saddle on Instagram @blkinthesaddle
Follow Abriana on Instagram @theabrianaj

Advertising Disclosure
Some links or mentions in this episode may be promotional or include affiliate partnerships. We only share what aligns with the values of Black in the Saddle and serves our community.

At five years old, Mikhail Proctor went for one pony ride at a fair and spent the rest of the day brushing horses and asking questions. Nobody in his family rode, so he found his own way in, cleaning stalls while friends took lessons and copying what he saw once the owners let him ride. That do-it-yourself grit carried him through show jumping, into equestrian vaulting, and eventually to co-founding Fleurs de Lis Vaulters, a nonprofit competitive vaulting club built on one rule above all others. The team is a family, and the horses are the MVPs.

Mikhail gets candid about why he'd never recommend his own path to anyone, how he coaches kids who talk back to their parents, and why he'll hold a team out of the ring until the horse is properly warmed up, whatever the schedule says. He also traces a career that ran from equine anesthesia to property management to equestrian marketing and now full-time photography, and explains what changed when he finally took the blinders off.

The conversation closes with a preview of his Kinship Conference session and a challenge for parents of horse-crazy kids. When your child names a big dream, skip the reasons it won't work and ask how they plan to get there.

Mentioned in this episode

• Fleur de Lis Vaulters, Mikhail's nonprofit vaulting club
• Mikhail's mentors and coaches who pushed him for more
• Goliath, the rescue horse who chose vaulting for him
• Kinship Conference, November 6–7, Greensboro NC

Connect with Mikhail on Instagram at @mikhail.proctor

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to like and subscribe! It helps get the podcast out to new listeners. I mean, while you're at it you should share it with a friend! I'm sure they'll enjoy this episode as much as you did.

Join Us at Kinship Conference

Mark your calendar: November 6–7, 2026 in Greensboro, NC.

Kinship is a two-day gathering for Black horse folks across every discipline. The FIRST event of its kind, Kinship is built on connection, mentorship, skill-sharing, and honoring the stories that shaped us. If you're looking for real community and real pathways forward in the horse industry, this is where you belong.

✨ Grab your ticket(s) TODAY: https://www.blkinthesaddle.com/kinship

Let's Keep in Touch:
Support the podcast on Patreon→ @blackinthesaddle
Join the newsletter to be the first to know EVERYTHING BITS : https://blkinthesaddle.kit.com/3e1170...
Follow Black In the Saddle on Instagram @blkinthesaddle
Follow Abriana on Instagram @theabrianaj

Advertising Disclosure
Some links or mentions in this episode may be promotional or include affiliate partnerships. We only share what aligns with the values of Black in the Saddle and serves our community.

Jamon Turner is back on Black in the Saddle three years after his first appearance and Just Believe has grown well past where it started. What began as half-day and full-day horsemanship camps is now a full youth development pipeline: a Western Playgrounds program that pulls in welders, fabricators, cattlemen, and cryotherapy coaches alongside horse trainers, an intern program where kids manage and pay other kids, and a colt-starting curriculum that teaches gun safety, critical thinking, and horsemanship ethics side by side.

This episode is a masterclass in running a mission-driven organization without burning yourself out funding it. Jamon breaks down the actual math of nonprofit horse programs, why leasing horses will bankrupt you, and gets honest about what it takes to bring on coaches and clinicians who have to see the vision of the program. The technical skills are great, but Jamon creates ways for students to practice leadership, community economics and team building.

Starting with just a stock trailer in a small Texas town, Just Believe has evolve so much since our first conversation. I think you'll enjoy hearing just what the process requires.

The conversation closes with a preview of what Jamon's bringing to the BITS Kinship Conference this November in North Carolina and why he said yes to it.

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to like and subscribe! It helps get the podcast out to new listeners. I mean, while you're at it you should share it with a friend! I'm sure they'll enjoy this episode as much as you did.

Join Us at Kinship Conference

Mark your calendar: November 6–7, 2026 in Greensboro, NC.

Kinship is a two-day gathering for Black horse folks across every discipline. The FIRST event of its kind, Kinship is built on connection, mentorship, skill-sharing, and honoring the stories that shaped us. If you're looking for real community and real pathways forward in the horse industry, this is where you belong.

✨ Grab your ticket(s) TODAY: https://www.blkinthesaddle.com/kinship

Let's Keep in Touch:
Support the podcast on Patreon→ @blackinthesaddle
Join the newsletter to be the first to know EVERYTHING BITS : https://blkinthesaddle.kit.com/3e1170...
Follow Black In the Saddle on Instagram @blkinthesaddle
Follow Abriana on Instagram @theabrianaj

Advertising Disclosure
Some links or mentions in this episode may be promotional or include affiliate partnerships. We only share what aligns with the values of Black in the Saddle and serves our community.

Join me as I sit with my good friend and horse girl sister, Natasha Gordon, for an unfiltered catch-up on ALL THE THINGS. Natasha walks us through buying her first horse, how she landed on her mare Tessa after nearly buying three other horses, refurbishing a $700 trailer from scratch, hauling Tessa twelve hours from Charlotte to Toledo after her grandmother's passing, and the six-month hoof injury that tested (and ultimately built) the trust between them.

Natasha traces her path from a childhood in a mostly white Ohio town, where she was told horses weren't for her, to discovering Compton Cowboys in San Diego and realizing there was an entire community of Black and brown riders she never knew existed. We talk about what it means to finally belong somewhere, and what they're each building next: land, education, and space for kids who never got the access they did.

In this episode:

- Finding her heart horse
- Refurbishing a $700 trailer and learning to haul solo
- The hoof injury that nearly ended Tessa's riding career
- Building community, land, and legacy for the next generation
- Natasha's creativity practice

Connect with Natasha:
@tashas.belle - or- TikTok and Instagram and search "Tasha Belle"

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to like and subscribe! It helps get the podcast out to new listeners. I mean, while you're at it you should share it with a friend! I'm sure they'll enjoy this episode as much as you did.

Join Us at Kinship Conference

Mark your calendar: November 6–7, 2026 in Greensboro, NC.

Kinship is a two-day gathering for Black horse folks across every discipline. The FIRST event of its kind, Kinship is built on connection, mentorship, skill-sharing, and honoring the stories that shaped us. If you're looking for real community and real pathways forward in the horse industry, this is where you belong.

✨ Grab your ticket(s) TODAY: https://www.blkinthesaddle.com/kinship

Let's Keep in Touch:
Support the podcast on Patreon→ @blackinthesaddle
Join the newsletter to be the first to know EVERYTHING BITS : https://blkinthesaddle.kit.com/3e11701aaf
Follow Black In the Saddle on Instagram @blkinthesaddle
Follow Abriana on Instagram @theabrianaj

Advertising Disclosure
Some links or mentions in this episode may be promotional or include affiliate partnerships. We only share what aligns with the values of Black in the Saddle and serves our community.

Dr. Letitia Mason has spent over two decades living in two worlds most people assume don't touch: elite academic admissions leadership and a horse program she and her mother ran out of High Point, North Carolina for 25 years. In this conversation, she traces it all the way back to a conversation with her grandfather about "a horse of a different color," through the founding of the HUD-funded Eagle Mounted Scholars Inner City Youth Initiative in 1982, into her PhD research on leadership self-efficacy, and finally back to the barn where she's now applying the very model she built in academia to youth equine work at Green Pastures Still Waters Barn.

In this episode we cover why she kept her horse life separate from her career for decades, the outcomes her program produced (zero dropouts, zero teen pregnancies, 25 years of kids going on to college or a trade), the story behind the Mason Leadership Self-Efficacy Model, and a real conversation about wild horse roundups, BLM policy, and why the internet's outrage cycle rarely tells the whole story. Dr. Mason is speaking at the Kinship Conference this November.

In this episode:

• The origin story behind Eagle Mounted Scholars and its 25-year run
• Building the Mason Leadership Self-Efficacy Model from lived observation, not a lab
• Why she hid her horse work from her academic colleagues for most of her career
• What she's looking forward to sharing at the Kinship Conference

Samir Geiger didn't grow up around horses. He grew up in the Bronx watching the Harlem parade go by, catching a glimpse of Black cowboys and cowgirls at the tail end of it, and soaking up Westerns at his grandparents' house. That glimpse turned into Be Worthy Horsemanship, a program built for kids in the New York and New Jersey school systems who'd never so much as touched a horse and in some cases, don't see one for the first four weeks of the program on purpose.

In this conversation, Samir walks through the injury that changed how he approaches horsemanship, the "goldfish club" icebreaker he uses to get kids thinking differently before they ever meet a horse, and the frameworks that turn a riding lesson into a lesson in patience, focus, and self-trust. He talks about building relationships with riding academies, running a roping clinic in the heart of Newark, and what it means for a kid to watch a Black man teach him how to read a horse. He's speaking at the Kinship Conference in November, and this episode is just a glimpse of what he's bringing.

Mentioned in this episode:

• Be Worthy Horsemanship 101
• Federation of Black Cowboys (Keisha Mars)
• Fletcher Street Urban Riding Club
• Jersey High School Rodeo
• Tom and Bill Dorrance, Ray Hunt, Buck Brannaman

Ifa Simmonds is back on the podcast after four years. That's a long time. When he was last on the podcast, he was training clients in a cold New Jersey barn and had just launched Equestrian Fitness Academy. Today he's studying equestrian sport science at Hartpury University in England, expanding his business internationally, and preparing to bring his work to the Kinship Conference this November.

In this conversation, we talk about what it took to leave everything behind and go back to school across the world, not just logistically, but mentally. Ifa gets into what entering equestrian culture as an outsider taught him about asking questions no one else is asking, and what it's been like to find community with Black equestrians in the UK through an organization called Cool Ridings.

We also get into what he's looking forward to at Kinship, what he wants attendees to walk away from his session feeling, and the moment at the end of the episode when he pulls out a note he's kept on his desk since listening back to their first conversation.

Topics covered:

• Returning to school after 10+ years and why he had to go to England to do it
• Entering the equestrian industry without growing up in it, and what fresh eyes reveal
• Rider fitness vs. horse fitness: why the industry consistently prioritizes one over the other
• Cool Ridings UK and Lydia Haywood's work building Black equestrian community in England
• Bringing it all to the Kinship Conference, the morning wellness session and what he's most excited about

Find Ifa:

• www.ifafit.com
• www.instagram.com/ifafit

If you enjoyed this episode, take a quick second and leave us a 5 star review! It helps get the podcast out to new listeners. I mean, while you're at it you should share it with a friend! I'm sure they'll enjoy this episode as much as you did.

Join us for the Kinship Conference: blkinthesaddle.com/kinship

Mark your calendar: November 6–7, 2026 in Greensboro, NC.

Let's Keep in Touch:

Join the newsletter to be the first to know EVERYTHING BITS

Follow Black In the Saddle on Instagram

Follow Abriana on Instagram

Subscribe to BITS on Youtube

Advertising Disclosure

Some links or mentions in this episode may be promotional or include affiliate partnerships. We only share what aligns with the values of Black in the Saddle and serves our community.

Mathena Washington grew up on horseback. From pony rides at three years old to volunteering at ranches in Georgia as a teenager, horses have been a constant thread through a life that's taken her from Boulder to Amarillo to Denver and back again. Now she's channeling everything she's built, an athletic background, a broadcast journalism degree from West Texas A&M, and years of community work, into one of the most intentional campaigns we've seen come through this community.

Mathena is currently running for Miss Black Rodeo USA 2027, and what she's building around that campaign goes far beyond the title. She's also founding the High Plains Legacy Riders Foundation and its youth program, Lead the Legacy, which is bringing inner-city kids in Denver face-to-face with horses, agricultural education, and the confidence that comes with it.

This episode is about what it looks like to build a campaign with mission and a program supported with strategy, faith, patience, and a very good calendar.

Resources & References:

• High Plains Legacy Riders Foundation (in development)
• Lead the Legacy youth program
• Mile High Equestrian and Rescue — Centennial, CO
• Miss Black Rodeo USA 2027 — pageant in Little Rock, AR, August 20–21
• Justin Great — hat designer and campaign sponsor
• Kime's Jeans — riding apparel
• Jordan Peele's High Horse documentary (2025)

If you enjoyed this episode, take a quick second and leave us a 5 star review! It helps get the podcast out to new listeners. I mean, while you're at it you should share it with a friend! I'm sure they'll enjoy this episode as much as you did.

Support Our Next Level on Patreon

Your support means we get to build connections with fellow horsefolk, pathways in our industry, and events that will change how we connect to our horses. Join us on Patreon to support Black in the Saddle and get access to bonus content, behind-the-scenes updates, and more ways to connect with the community. → patreon.com/blackinthesaddle

Join Us at Kinship Conference

Mark your calendar: November 6–7, 2026 in Greensboro, NC.

Kinship is a two-day gathering for Black horse folks across every discipline. The FIRST event of its kind, Kinship is built on connection, mentorship, skill-sharing, and honoring the stories that shaped us. If you're looking for real community and real pathways forward in the horse industry, this is where you belong.

✨ Join the waitlist + learn more: www.blkinthesaddle.com/kinship

Let's Keep in Touch:

Join the newsletter to be the first to know EVERYTHING BITS

Follow Black In the Saddle on Instagram

Follow Abriana on Instagram

Subscribe to BITS on Youtube

Advertising Disclosure

Some links or mentions in this episode may be promotional or include affiliate partnerships. We only share what aligns with the values of Black in the Saddle and serves our community.