My equestrian training included studies in diverse disciplines, four years of basic Hunter Seat equitation with a focus on show hunters, jumpers, and fox hunting. The curriculum also included daily care, principles and practices of managing a barn, basic health care, including how to provide simple veterinarian care, as well as classes in the principles of teaching riding. Four years of Dressage training in a program at a German (Augsburg) Riding Academy on exceptional school horses, educated through the upper levels.

I began my professional career in the Bay Area of California, where I continued my education, expanding my experience to include Eventing and Endurance riding while running my own operation, which included buying, training, competing, and selling open jumpers, eventers, and eventually endurance horses. During that time, I decided to specialize in rider biomechanics, teaching Centered Riding Clinics. I also continued to work with horses by coaching their riders (English and western) on how to successfully educate their own horses.

I have been a carded A.H.S.A. judge (H, J, and HS equitation), a member of the A.R.I.A. Certification Board, and a Level 3 Centered Riding Clinician under Sally Swift. I have been a featured speaker at Equitana, Equine Affair, Iowa Horse Fair, and The Western States Horse Expo (to name a few). My favorite, 30-year-long "side hustle", was as a free lance journalist, my articles published in national industry magazines including The Chronicle of the Horse, Arabian Horse World, Western Horseman, Horse & Rider, and Trail Blazer (where I served as editor for several years.

Horses have been my life. They have also been my counselors, guardians, and guides, giving me the strength to take back the life taken from me by PTSD from early childhood trauma.

My clients have been successful in a variety of disciplines, consistently making me proud. Ribbons, trophies, and titles included "State of California Champion English Girl, California Dressage Society 2nd Level Musical Kur Amateur Champion, 2000 Western States 100 Mile One Day Endurance Race winner, and two World Equestrian Games gold medalists (Holland and Kentucky and a bronze medal at the Pan American Championships.

My books include: The Alchemy of the Horse, The All-Around Horse and Rider, The Complete Guide to Endurance Riding and Competition, and The Classic Western Rider.

Today, while I am technically retired, I like to put my 60 years of experience to work helping horse lovers, riders and owners via my Facebook (Donna Snyder-Smith411) page learn of cutting edge answers to old questions, new, "next level" concepts in training, and occasionally review deserving professionals who demonstrate not just knowledge, but an ethical standard that puts the horse FIRST. With the release of my latest book, "The Alchemy of the Horse," I continue to share my knowledge of what horses bring to our lives, and how the ever-growing awareness of their connection to us could well change the entire face of the equestrian industry by the time we arrive at the 22nd century! Join me for the two days of the Faire to experience some exciting, mind-expanding, new, and challenging ideas.

Because of the Horse...

I didn't just survive the effects of PTSD. I created a successful career as an instructor and national clinician in the equestrian arts, passing along what I was taught by the horses I worked with daily. I feel I owe horses my life and a duty to help others who love and honor them as I do, see and hear them "speak," just as I learned to do.