An Equestrian Fitness Training Program
Meet Your Trainer
About Robin
I have been working in the fitness industry for over thirty years and I have been riding horses since I was a kid!
I believe with all my heart that we owe it to the horses we ride, to be as physically fit as we train them to be!
I also believe that Pilates and its six principles are equal to the elements of The Scales of Training used to develop horses! They are both foundations for correct, balanced & efficient movement and when combined in training the benefits are limitless.
I have enjoyed working with all kinds of people & populations: athletes, injured, sedentary, old, young, overweight, underweight but I have especially enjoyed my equestrian clients because of my own passion for horses. I have been able to connect with them fundamentally! That is why I created my program and opened Rocking Horse Fitness, LLC.
“Physical fitness is the first requisite of happiness” Joseph Pilates
I am a native of Virginia and started taking riding lessons as a kid. I was lucky enough to ride at Junior Equitation in Vienna, Virginia owned by Jane Marshall Dillion. I leased horses and went to local horse shows and then went on to college. It was not until I was an adult that I owned my own horses.
I attended Virginia Wesleyan College (now University) and earned a B.A. in Mass Communications. I took a class in Health Studies my senior year and it completely changed the trajectory of what I wanted to study next!
I immediately began graduate work in Exercise Physiology at George Washington University. I took a job in a very progressive health club and was trained in Exercise Testing & Prescription by one of the founders of The American College of Sports Medicine. I was learning so much about anatomy & kinesiology…I was hooked! I was writing exercise prescriptions and training so many different kinds of clients. The Fitness Industry was exploding!
Simultaneously I was working on my own fitness and feeling what worked and what did not in my own body. It was very exciting!
After about a year I moved to California and began working in two very different environments. I was hired at The Palms, in Palm Springs, a Fitness Resort, where I taught several group exercise formats including Aerobic Dance, Muscle Fitness, Yoga, Step Aerobics and Aqua Aerobics. I also led the Fitness Walks and did some Personal Training for the “Rich & Famous.”
My other job was nearby, at The Heart Institute of The Desert, in the same compound as The Eisenhower Hospital and The Betty Ford Clinic. It was founded by Dr. Jack J. Sternlieb, a famous heart surgeon who had just put a pacemaker in Betty Ford. It was a much more clinical setting and I worked as an Exercise Physiologist mostly with cardiac rehab patients and with a designated “Overweight” group. I actually got to meet the very first heart transplant patient while I was there!
Both jobs were very inspiring and I learned so much! I had to be and entertainer, an intellectual, an educator and a motivator!
I then moved back to Virginia and took on a management role with the same Health Club operation. They had expanded so I was working in several locations. I managed the Group Exercise team and learned a lot about budgets, staff management, marketing and customer service. I also developed very close relationships with my co-workers and new we truly worked as a team to bring health & fitness to our members. I relied heavily on my sense of humor to keep all the balls in the air!
I was maintaining the Group Exercise and Personal Training credentials I had with continuing education credits and attending as many fitness conferences as possible. At this time Indoor Cycling became popular and it added a whole new type of client to group exercise. I immediately got my certification with Robert Sherman, Cycle Reebok and updated it again several years later with Schwinn. I loved the intensity, the music & the education it brought to cardiovascular training!
“When all your muscles are properly developed, you will, as a matter of course, perform your work with minimum effort and
maximum pleasure.”
Joseph Pilates
In 1999, while still working for the clubs, I went to The Body College in Washington D.C. where I became comprehensively trained in Pilates. I earned my certification from The Physical Mind Institute and a fews years later I passed the international exam for The Pilates Method Alliance, now The National Pilates Certification Program, NPCP.
I fell in love with Pilates. I incorporated in to my own practice as well as my clients. This education brought all of the elements of my training together and I felt like I had all of the pieces I needed to be a truly qualified fitness professional.
After several years I began riding again and saw the difference my fitness and pilates training had made. I had improved so much in my own ability to connect my seat, use my aids and understand what my trainer was asking me to do and more importantly why it was helping my horse move more freely.
"That horse is a Ferrari and you're riding him like a garbage truck."–Hilda C. Gurney
I began to increase my focus on my equestrian clients and also began working with riding instructors of all disciplines. When studying basic dressage and flatwork I realized how my riding trainers and me as a pilates trainer, were using almost the same language to get almost the same results from our clients.
BOOM!
I was passionate about horses and knew that pilates training, specifically, offered so much value to the sport of riding…all disciplines included!
At that point I made equestrian fitness & pilates training the focus of my career and in 2014 I opened ROCKING HORSE FITNESS, LCC.
I currently work mostly with Equestrians. I enhance the training they are already doing with their riding instructors and I often work with them as well! I make training educational, enjoyable and beneficial for both the horse and the rider. I try to create a fun learning environment, introducing concepts, perhaps in a new way with no judgement or expectations other than commitment and consistency!
The horse and the rider are a team and should be trained to speak the same language with their bodies while they are in motion together. My goal is to facilitate this amazing connection with my program at Rocking Horse Fitness.
HIGHLIGHTS
- Group Exercise Instructor, AFFA
- Personal Trainer, NASM
- Pilates Trainer, NCPT
- Indoor Cycle Trainer, SCHWINN
- Health Coach, ACE
- Member, PMA
- Member, USEF
- Member, Chamber of Commerce, Middleburg, Virginia
Meet Your Trainer
About Robin
I have been working in the fitness industry for over thirty years and I have been riding horses since I was a kid!
I believe with all my heart that we owe it to the horses we ride, to be as physically fit, as we train them to be!
I also believe that pilates and it’s six principles are equal to the elements of The Scales of Training used to develop horses! They are both foundations for correct, balanced & efficient movement and when combined in training the benefits are limitless.
I have enjoyed working with all kinds of people & populations; athletes, injured, sedentary, old, young, overweight, underweight but I have especially enjoyed my equestrian clients because of my own passion for horses. I have been able to connect with them fundamentally! That is why I created my program and opened Rocking Horse Fitness, LLC.
“Physical fitness is the first requisite of happiness” Joseph Pilates
I am a native of Virginia and started taking riding lessons as a kid. I was lucky enough to ride at Junior Equitation in Vienna, Virginia owned by Jane Marshall Dillion. I leased horses and went to local horse shows and then went on to college. It was not until I was an adult that I owned my own horses.
I attended Virginia Wesleyan College (now University) and earned a B.A. in Mass Communications. I took a class in Health Studies my senior year and it completely changed the trajectory of what I wanted to study next!
I immediately began graduate work in Exercise Physiology at George Washington University. I took a job in a very progressive health club and was trained in Exercise Testing & Prescription by one of the founders of The American College of Sports Medicine. I was learning so much about anatomy & kinesiology…I was hooked! I was writing exercise prescriptions and training so many different kinds of clients. The Fitness Industry was exploding!
Simultaneously I was working on my own fitness and feeling what worked and what did not in my own body. It was very exciting!
After about a year I moved to California and began working in two very different environments. I was hired at The Palms, in Palm Springs, a Fitness Resort, where I taught several group exercise formats including Aerobic Dance, Muscle Fitness, Yoga, Step Aerobics and Aqua Aerobics. I also led the Fitness Walks and did some Personal Training for the “Rich & Famous.”
My other job was nearby, at The Heart Institute of The Desert, in the same compound as The Eisenhower Hospital and The Betty Ford Clinic. It was founded by Dr. Jack J. Sternlieb, a famous heart surgeon who had just put a pacemaker in Betty Ford. It was a much more clinical setting and I worked as an Exercise Physiologist mostly with cardiac rehab patients and with a designated “Overweight” group. I actually got to meet the very first heart transplant patient while I was there!
Both jobs were very inspiring and I learned so much! I had to be and entertainer, an intellectual, an educator and a motivator!
I then moved back to Virginia and took on a management role with the same Health Club operation. They had expanded so I was working in several locations. I managed the Group Exercise team and learned a lot about budgets, staff management, marketing and customer service. I also developed very close relationships with my co-workers and new we truly worked as a team to bring health & fitness to our members. I relied heavily on my sense of humor to keep all the balls in the air!
I was maintaining the Group Exercise and Personal Training credentials I had with continuing education credits and attending as many fitness conferences as possible. At this time Indoor Cycling became popular and it added a whole new type of client to group exercise. I immediately got my certification with Robert Sherman, Cycle Reebok and updated it again several years later with Schwinn.
I loved the intensity, the music & the education it brought to cardiovascular training!
In 1999, while still working for the clubs, I went to The Body College in Washington D.C. where I became comprehensively trained in Pilates. I earned my certification from The Physical Mind Institute and a fews years later I passed the international exam for The Pilates Method Alliance, now The National Pilates Certification Program, NPCP.
I fell in love with Pilates. I incorporated in to my own practice as well as my clients. This education brought all of the elements of my training together and I felt like I had all of the pieces I needed to be a truly qualified fitness professional.
After several years I began riding again and saw the difference my fitness and pilates training had made. I had improved so much in my own ability to connect my seat, use my aids and understand what my trainer was asking me to do and more importantly why it was helping my horse move more freely.
"That horse is a Ferrari and you're riding him like a garbage truck."–Hilda C. Gurney
I began to increase my focus on my equestrian clients and also began working with riding instructors of all disciplines. When studying basic dressage and flatwork I realized how my riding trainers and me as a pilates trainer, were using almost the same language to get almost the same results from our clients.
BOOM!
I was passionate about horses and knew that pilates training, specifically, offered so much value to the sport of riding…all disciplines included!
At that point I made equestrian fitness & pilates training the focus of my career and in 2014 I opened ROCKING HORSE FITNESS, LCC.
I currently work mostly with Equestrians. I enhance the training they are already doing with their riding instructors and I often work with them as well! I make training educational, enjoyable and beneficial for both the horse and the rider. I try to create a fun learning environment, introducing concepts, perhaps in a new way with no judgement or expectations other than commitment and consistency!
The horse and the rider are a team and should be trained to speak the same language with their bodies while they are in motion together. My goal is to facilitate this amazing connection with my program at Rocking Horse Fitness.
HIGHLIGHTS
- Group Exercise Instructor, AFFA
- Personal Trainer, NASM
- Pilates Trainer, NPCP
- Indoor Cycle Trainer, SCHWINN
- Health Coach, ACE
- Member, PMA
- Member, USEF
- Member, Chamber of Commerce, Middleburg, Virginia
HOW YOU CAN WORK WITH ME
Rock Your Ride
Clinics
Virtual Sessions
We can teach you remotely through technology with Face Time or *Zoom
*Zoom sessions have the ability to be recorded and watched repeatedly
Take a look at our proud partners
Sara Spofford Dressage
Crick Hollow Dressage
