The May podcast of the American Hanoverian Society focuses on starting young horses, and the conversation is interesting, thought-provoking, and entertaining. It’s worth a listen!
The guests of host Laura St. Claire are Michael Bragdell of Hilltop Farm in Maryland and Emily Miles of Wallywoo Farm in Kansas. Michael is well-known for his work as Training Director at Hilltop Farm, and has twice won the USEF 4-Year-Old National Championships, among many other successes; be brought Qredit Hilltop up through the levels from a yearling to a successful Grand Prix competitor. Emily is a young horse trainer known as a beautiful rider (a German judge at the North American Stallion Test called her riding, “what dressage riding should look like.”); she has won every young horse and developing horse division at the National Championships, and represented the US at the Young Horse Championships in Germany and The Netherlands.
They cover a lot of ground in 50 minutes. As well as some practical training advice, they cover such topics as the state of showing young horses today, the scarcity of young horse starters and how to interest more riders in young horse training, the joys of training young horses, the need for a strong base of US-bred horses, plus when to start a young horse and what a breeder can do to prepare for training.
“The only way we’re going to have a strong horse base here is if our breeders are supported….”
—Emily Miles
You can’t go wrong with these two – click here to listen.
