SDS Riding Academy
The Riding Academy at Specially Designed Stables is a curriculum based weekly riding program. ​
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Q&A
How long are lessons? Each riding lesson is a full 30 minutes of riding. Students are more than welcome to come early and stay after to tack and untack their horse.
What are your age requirements? Currently taking students age 8 and up.
Private or Group lessons? All new students start in an intro private lesson to be evaluated. Beginner students will then stay in a private lesson (for 1-2 months to learn basic skills) while others will be moved into a group lesson.
Why group lessons? After a decade of lessons at SDS we have found that all our students progress faster in a group setting. Being able to ride with others and watch other riders at different skills levels offers endless opportunities for knowledge.
What hours and days do lessons run? Our lessons run Tuesday-Friday year-round. During the school year group lessons run from 3pm-6pm at 3:30pm, 4:30pm & 5:30pm and during the summer group lessons run 9am-noon at 9am, 10am and 11am. Intro lessons run in the 30 minute breaks between group lessons daily. Please note we teach no lessons in the afternoon in the summer months. Our horses do a wonderful job keeping our students safe and always learning. We feel they deserve to have the heat of the day off.
How much does it cost? SDS Riding Academy is currently tuition based at $200/month. This includes 44 weeks of lessons per year (1 lesson per week, same time, same day) and one horsemanship class per month. We also believe that our horses are deserving of time off. So there are 8 weeks built in for our horses to have vacation time.
Why tuition based? We feel it is important for students who ride to do so regularly and, on a schedule, (1x/week at least) to keep up with their skills. Every other sport functions this way and horseback riding should be treated no differently. Not only are our horses athletes but also our riders.
Do you offer jumping? We offer no jumping in our Riding Academy. We firmly believe that if you would like to get into jumping you should be riding multiple times a week and own or lease your own horse. The base level maintenance care of these lesson horses is already very high. To expect them to also jump would require a much higher level of care that most are not willing to or expecting to see reflected in lesson prices. If jumping is your goal in the future, we would be more than happy to cover all basic riding skills in your lessons and then help you find an appropriate place to lease or board your own horse and continue your knowledge.
What type of riding do you specialize in? All our riding lessons are English based on the flat leaning towards dressage tendencies (after all Dressage just means the art of training). We believe the good horsemanship is good horsemanship. If you are balanced on the horse and can influence the horse without disrupting them then you have a great foundation to ride any seat you would like in the future.
Do you offer leasing or boarding? We offer neither at SDS. Our goal is to provide structured riding lessons to as many students who would like the opportunity. This requires us to keep our stalls filled with a wide variety of horses of many breeds and skill levels. Students who are interested in owning or leasing in the future have a great foundation coming out of our riding program and we have helped moved many onto leases or ownerships at other local farms.
What about the horses? Our horses are our pride and joy and their comfort and care is our top priority. We have a wide variety of breeds and experience levels for our littlest riders to adults coming back to the sport later in life. Our horses all get regular vet, farrier, chiropractic and dental work. Mentioned above they also get 8 weeks of vacation per year with 3-4 of the weeks all being back-to-back in the month of December, allowing them an extended mental and physical break from their jobs. Keeping our horses happy is essential to providing the solid lesson program offered to our students.
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What other programs do you offer? All of our Riding Academy students have access to in house horse shows, riding camps and curriculum testing. We offer 5-6 horse shows per year and curriculum testing 2x per year.
What is the curriculum and testing? Our program is based around many different sets of skills broken into different levels and divided between groundwork and riding. Students can test at both skill sets or groundwork skills only multiple times a year and receive a progress report based on the testing.
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Email spdesigned@gmail.com for additional details and to schedule your intro lesson!