Kaleigh Marie
Liberty Clinician, Horse Trainer, & Riding Instructor
The wide variety of opportunities that shaped her early on in her career paired with influences from trainers from across the globe has led her to use her experiences from traveling, teaching, and performing internationally to develop her own unique approach to training. Her program focuses on creating a connection that accommodates all levels through utilizing a deep understanding of psychology and learning theory, classical dressage, and positive reinforcement to help humans and horses reach new heights with liberty work, bridleless riding, and dressage. Through inspiring performances with her horses and effective tools that she shares with her students through in-person clinics and lessons, as well as her online academy, she embodies the belief that a strong connection is the key to working successfully with horses in any discipline, and that working horses at liberty helps us to become who our horses need us to be.
Kaleigh Marie is a passionate equestrian who is dedicated to strengthening the connection people have with their horses and deepening the understanding they have of themselves. Born in Charleston, South Carolina, she grew up loving animals of all kinds. Kaleigh discovered her passion for horses at the age of 5 after her family moved to Waitsfield, Vermont and she started riding lessons at a small, local barn. Kaleigh’s childhood was occupied by spending time with horses there, as well as with cattle at a local dairy farm, and fulfilling her curiosity about these animals, what their language was, and how to understand them. Today, her curiosity only continues to grow.
She developed her very first training techniques on a team of young Holstein steers that she named Simon and Oliver, who were gifted to her by the man who owned the dairy farm where she worked. She trained them to be a team of working cattle, or oxen, and successfully competed with them through the national level. She and her steers were known for their unique skills of riding, liberty work, performing tricks, and Roman riding. The deep understanding she had of her animals set her training apart from others, and soon led to teaching opportunities in her teenage years that created the foundation for the business she runs today.
Kaleigh Marie helps others discover the power of connection through clinics, lessons, and demonstrations that improve relationships, communication, and levels of performance both from the ground, at liberty, and under saddle. Her main areas of focus equine behavior, liberty work and bridleless riding, classical dressage, and positive reinforcement.
She taught with her team at colleges and international agricultural organizations across the country before deciding to reconnect with her love for horses. With time and experience, her training grew to include donkeys and mules as well. Kaleigh’s learning as a young professional continued as she took advantage of as many opportunities as she could to build on her understanding of the animals she worked with. This included driving draft horses and mammoth donkeys, starting young horses, retraining problem horses and rehabilitating rescues, and also riding with the Tempel Lipizzans, where she studied classical dressage on Lipizzan stallions with top tier instructors and world renowned clinicians.
Kaleigh eventually discovered liberty work with horses as a young adult and has been dedicated to learning its art ever since. She began sharing the principles of liberty work and building connection with horses through clinics and lessons, as well as performances and exhibitions with her personal horses. The time she spent teaching and performing led Kaleigh to become enamored with uncovering knowledge about how horses learn and what shapes their experiences and connections with us, and how improving and understanding ourselves is often the first step to finding success with our horses, whatever that definition of success may be. This passion for learning has led her to connect with and learn from masterful horsemen and women all over the world to continuously improve herself, her horses, and her ability to share the things she learns with others.
