Kirsten’s love for horses started the day she had her first pony ride at the school fair. Coming from a non-horsey family, the journey slowly progressed from casual rides of a friend’s pony after school, to local riding school lessons, then a lease pony, then inevitably horse ownership. Kirsten’s first horse was purchased with her pocket money and was a little Arab that wanted to go everywhere fast with its head in the air - most suited to endurance! When that pony didn’t quite work out, naively, her next purchase (again with her pocket money), was an OTT! She got bucked off twice trying to ride to the warm up at her first show and couldn’t work out why she was lapping people in the hack ring, but thankfully her parents were supportive and funded weekly lessons where the important basics were learnt. Competitions soon started to take priority in her life at regular dressage, hacking and show jumping days. At 15yo she started riding other people’s horses for between $5-$20 and began coaching a few younger kids.

When she moved to the City for University and couldn’t afford agistment, she offered to ride young horses at an Eventing stable. Here is where she discovered her real passion; XC! After University Kirsten dedicated her time to producing many Off The Track horses for Eventing, whilst running a successful coaching, horse training and horse sales business. She spent years developing her riding skills and horse management, and gradually progressed up the grades in Eventing, though sadly having to sell a few fantastic horses along the way to fund the journey. Whilst the majority of her horses were OTTs, she also competed several WBs and rode different breeds of clients’ horses at various levels. She was a member of high performance squads with a couple of her 3 Star and 4 Star level horses and has competed in Eventing or Show Jumping in 5 different Australian states.

Now in her mid 40’s, Kirsten loves her horses as much as ever. Training remains her passion, whether it is breaking in a young horse, training walk-to-canter transitions, or jumping 120cm tracks. She takes every horse’s personality in to account and attempts to factor in different horses’ quirks and individual needs in her approach and methods.

Very importantly, Kirsten doesn’t believe that success requires talent, as she doesn’t consider herself a talented rider. She believes in having training methods that are step by step approaches to meeting a goal, and being able to read the horse and adjust the training as required. She strongly believes that horse management plays a huge role in the partnership between horse and rider; that having strategies for keeping horses sound, healthy, comfortable in their bodies and minds, happy in their paddocks and in their work, is essential to long term success. Kirsten continues her own education in all these areas, as even now her current horses challenge her and require new learnings and techniques to bring out their best!

Bringing all this knowledge and experience forward to assist other riders, Kirsten coaches with a compassionate outlook and holistic overview. She recognises that not all riders have the same goals and is perfectly happy to tailor her lessons towards confidence boosting fun sessions, to serious detailed work for the more ambitious riders. Whether someone is a nervous rider just starting out over poles, or whether they are training 2* apexes, Kirsten is dedicated to helping any rider who tries hard and puts in the effort to learn.

Kirsten also doesn’t take herself or her riding too seriously – just ask about the time she rode camels, ponies, yaks and reindeer across Mongolia! Whether it’s riding the trails, dressage or jumping, Kirsten just loves being able to share the sense of fun, freedom and adventure that riding can offer.