The Elevated Equestrian

There's more horse information at your fingertips than ever, and somehow owners are more anxious than ever. Fran of The Honest Equine wants to help you become a better observer of your horse without becoming an anxious one.

Fran is an equine musculoskeletal and rehabilitation practitioner based in the north of England. She spent years in racing and racehorse retraining before studying equine therapy and rehabilitation at university, and her work now spans functional assessment, hands-on treatment, rehab, prehab, and owner education. She's built her practice around knowing her scope, working as part of a team with vets, farriers, saddle fitters, and trainers, and being honest with owners about what their horse is actually telling them.

We get into what "evidence-based" really means (it's not finding one study that agrees with you), why sometimes the most evidence-informed answer is "we don't know yet," and why a horse with horrendous X-rays can be going beautifully. We talk about prehab as building the capacity your horse needs before it becomes the thing holding them back, why variety in surfaces, terrain, and work matters, and how long lining or watching someone else ride your horse shows you what you can't feel from the saddle. Then we walk through the rehab path for a kissing spines horse: what injections and mesotherapy actually do (they don't create space between the spinous processes, they buy you a window), why groundwork comes before the rider, and why Fran works within the limits of the horse, not the rider. We also talk about serviceably sound horses, Sue Dyson's Ridden Horse Pain Ethogram, and why not every behavior is a diagnosis.

If you've ever scrolled past a post and thought "oh no, my horse does that," this one's for you.

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Every horse professional has been told there's no money in horses. Colton Woods thinks that belief is exactly what's keeping you broke.

Colton spent a decade training hunters, jumpers, and dressage horses in Lexington, Kentucky before pivoting to what he does now: helping established horse professionals build businesses that actually pay them. He and his wife Meredith run Horse Business Builders out of North Texas, and in this episode he walks through his own story, from starting with $3,000 and a two-door Acura full of tack, to a half-empty barn at $800 a month full training, to the mentor phone call that changed everything. The people who wanted to send him horses weren't holding back because he was too expensive. They were holding back because he was too cheap to take proper care of their horse. He raised his prices 50% and had a waitlist within 90 days.

We get into why marketing is an act of service and not a sales pitch, his CVC framework for getting clear on your calling, your vehicle, and your client, why a decision literally means cutting everything else away, and the question his wife uses to keep him honest: does this take your face, your voice, your skills, or your talent? If not, why are you the one doing it? We also talk about what "sustainable" actually means when you're mentally, physically, and financially drained, why mindset is most of the coaching he does, and the single most powerful question he asks every professional he works with: if you could do your very best work with the right horse and the right client, what would that look like, and what would have to be true to make it possible?

If your business feels more like a cage than a vehicle, this one's for you.

Follow The Elevated Equestrian so you never miss an episode, and if this one lands, send it to a horse professional who needs to hear it.

What if you worked out your hourly rate and it came to six pence? That's exactly what happened to one barn owner — and it's more common than you think. In this episode, Samantha Baer sits down with Cheryl Johns, founder of LiveryList (the UK's leading livery yard directory) and the Yard Owner Hub, to talk about the business side of the horse world nobody wants to discuss: why barn owners consistently undervalue their time, why cheap yards stay full while high-quality barns struggle to fill stalls, the guilt culture around raising board prices, and how unregulated the livery industry really is. Cheryl shares how she built LiveryList from a literal dream in 2010 into a 15-year business with 800+ yards, plus the organizational systems that let her run it all solo. Whether you run a barn, board a horse, or dream of doing either, this conversation will change how you think about what horse care is actually worth.

Follow The Elevated Equestrian wherever you listen, and find everything Samantha is up to at samanthabaer.com.

Not everyone with a deep passion for horses ends up making a living riding them. Some of them end up orbiting the sport instead — building the products, platforms, and services the rest of us depend on. That's what this new series is about.

First up: Laura St. Clair, Hanoverian breeder and co-founder and CEO of ICONEQ, a sport horse platform people tend to describe as Zillow for sport horses. Every horse in one place, fully searchable, pedigrees hyperlinked, priced, located, and not buried under fifty Facebook groups.

Laura's background is commercial real estate, and it shows — she came into this looking at how we present and market sport horses in this country and found most of it counterproductive. We talk about why the breeding market is struggling, why "inquire for price" is quietly costing sellers buyers, what actually makes a listing work, and how registry partnerships with the American Trakehner Association, KWPN-NA, and the American Hanoverian Society are changing where horses get discovered.

We also get into Yards, ICONEQ's newer functionality that makes training services searchable by location, why recognizing young horse trainers matters, and how a technology company ends up trying to make this industry more human rather than less.

Find Laura: iconEQ.com | ICONEQ Technologies on Facebook

More from me: samanthabaer.com — training philosophy, blog, and Ride Along, my audio subscription that puts you in my pocket for real rides with real horses. Start with the 2 free lessons.

Why does your horse stand crooked — and what is it costing him? In this episode, Dr. Karen Gellman, veterinarian and research scientist behind Postural Rehabilitation, explains how neutral posture is the foundation of soundness, and why the most common lamenesses we treat trace back to a horse who simply can't stand up square.

We cover the three factors driving abnormal compensatory posture — the hooves, the teeth, and the upper cervical spine — and why fixing only one of them means the horse reverts within weeks. Dr. Gellman breaks down how the TMJ is hardwired into postural control, why an untreated overjet or offset jaw changes where a horse loads his feet, and how negative palmar angles crush the navicular bone and cause navicular disease.

We also get into hypermobility and ECVM, why instability presents as anxiety and spookiness, and what "up foot/down foot" really tells you about a horse's whole body.

If this episode gave you something to look at differently, follow the show wherever you're listening — it genuinely helps more horse people find it.

For training resources, ride-along lessons, and everything else I'm working on, head to samanthabaer.com

What does it take to keep the world's top horses sound — and what can everyday horse owners learn from it? In this episode, I sit down with Harry Spinks, a UK-based farrier who shoes everything from family ponies to international competition horses and served on the IOC farrier team at the Tokyo Olympics. Harry breaks down why the average hoof visibly grows out of balance in just three and a half weeks, why so many front end lamenesses actually start in the hind end, and what a truly healthy foot should look like. We dig into the barefoot debate with refreshing honesty, why your farrier, vet, and body worker need to work as a team, and what it's really like shoeing horses under Olympic pressure. Whether your horse lives in steel, glue-ons, or nothing at all, this conversation will change how you look at their feet.

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What if your horse's mystery lameness, spooky behavior, or separation anxiety isn't a training problem — but stored trauma? In this episode, I sit down with Mandy McConechy, founder of The Neural Shift Method, to explore how the nervous system holds onto physical and emotional trauma in both horses and riders — and how releasing it at the root cause can change everything.

Mandy is a former intermediate-level eventer whose career ended in burnout and chronic pain. After being told she'd have to live with a herniated disc, she discovered how suppressed emotions were physically reshaping her body — and that discovery led her to a method that works with horses and humans as one connected unit.

We get into pain pathways and why horses stay lame no matter what the vet nerve blocks, how the brain creates compensation patterns from sound, sight, and past trauma, and why weaning shows up as a root cause in nearly 97% of the horses Mandy works with. We also dig into the horse-rider mirror — how your nervous system directly shapes your horse's body and behavior, and how releasing something in the rider can unlock a breakthrough in the horse overnight.

Whether you're dealing with an unexplained lameness, a "difficult" horse, or your own riding anxiety, this conversation will change how you see your horse — and yourself.

Follow the show so you never miss an episode, and visit samanthabaer.com for the blog, ride-alongs, and more.

In this episode of The Elevated Equestrian Podcast, host Samantha Baer sits down with equine conditioning expert and best-selling author Jec Ballou for a deep dive into training horses for longevity and soundness.

Drawing on her background in equine exercise physiology and classical dressage, Jec breaks down why fitness is protective — and why pulling your horse out of work the moment something goes wrong often does more harm than good. You'll learn the difference between the small postural muscles that stabilize your horse and the big gymnastic muscles that tend to take over, how to make your lunging genuinely productive instead of just drilling circles, why cantering is one of the best ways to build a true top line, and how stress and shut-down behavior physically block your horse from absorbing the work you put in.

Whether you ride dressage, event, trail, or just want a sounder, happier horse, this conversation will change how you think about conditioning, groundwork, and what it really means to train for the long haul.

Find more at samanthabaer.com — and hit follow so you never miss an episode.

Follow The Elevated Equestrian so you never miss an episode—and if this one shifts something for you, share it with a riding friend who needs to hear it.

What if the way you ride—your busy hands, your collapsing core, the leg that just won't stay quiet—isn't a habit you need to drill away, but a pattern your body has been building for decades?

In this episode, I sit down with rider biomechanics coach Suzanne Galdun, one of only a handful of people in the world certified at her level in Mary Wanless's Ride With Your Mind method. We get deep into the physics, anatomy, and neuroscience of how you actually sit on a horse—and why your nervous system, your fascia, and even an ankle you sprained 25 years ago are showing up in every ride.

We talk about mirror neurons and how horses feel your anxiety before you do, why "sit up straight" almost never works (and what sensory-specific language to use instead), why a horse can't be in self-carriage until the rider is, and how the patterns in your body off the horse—how you hold a steering wheel, how you walk, how you sit at your desk—follow you straight into the saddle. We also get into the stuff most riding instruction skips entirely: pain, the pelvic floor, mind-body connection, and the fact that you can rewire all of it, no matter your age.

If you've ever had a magical ride you couldn't explain or repeat, this one's for you.

Most horses aren't born with the core strength to carry us — and the ones that are tend to sell for a fortune. Everyone else? We have to build it, deliberately and patiently.

In this episode, Samantha sits down with classically trained European rider Simon Cocozza, author of Core Conditioning for Horses. After years of buying and producing high-level horses across Germany and Holland, Simon kept hitting the same hidden wall: backs that weren't functioning, and horses quietly coping with pain they're hardwired to disguise. He shares the research that reframed his entire approach — including a study finding that 91% of sales x-rays showed some form of bone-to-bone contact in the back — and the method he developed to rebuild the spine from the ground up.

We get into the signs your horse's back isn't optimal (asymmetry, girthiness, "flat tires" in the downward transitions), why the spine — not the legs — is almost always the missing piece, how to actually stretch your horse so it does something, and why Simon does up to 50% of his work in hand even with finished competition horses. There's also an honest conversation about drilling, "karmic debt," and what it really means to make a horse 1% better every day.

Find Simon's book and his Core Conditioning audio warm-ups at coreconditioningforhorses.com.

Enjoyed this one? Follow the show so you never miss an episode, and head to samanthabaer.com for the blog, ride-alongs, and more.