All about us & our equine friends

PRESSLER CLASSICAL RIDING & BEHAVIOURAL TRAINING

We are Jay & Sarah Pressler & husband & wife team, we have two teenage children & four equines (see our horses page). We live near Dorking in Surrey.

Jay has 33 years experience riding & training horses & 21 years teaching experience He trained as an BHS II and was lucky enough during his training to be enlightened by Heir Franz Rochowansky who was chief rider for the Spanish riding school(1937-1955). This sparked his passion for classical methods. Jay has successfully competed BSJA A & also worked on several a carriage driving yards. He has had the pleasure of breaking truly wild horses from the veld of South Africa & even a zebra. (not advised) He enjoys coaching people to achieve the best results with their horses in whatever discipline they choose, be it happy hacking or top level competition. He is passionate & patient in his training methods.

Sarah trained to her BHS stage 2 before meeting Jay & also being enlightened to a classical approach. She has 20 years experience riding & handling. Sarah has competed successfully in all disciplines on other peoples horses as a teenager, and re-trained many ex-racehorses. After having the children, she has had great success with nervous & difficult horses and especially enjoys the breaking & schooling of youngsters. Sarah is a proficient carriage driver & enjoys breaking horses for driving too.
Sarah specialises in groundwork & behavioural training & has a very patient, understanding manner with people & horses alike. She is furthering her classical teacher training.

We both enjoy riding, driving & competing on our own horses, and enlightening others to the joy of classical equitation.

Our Special Maddie !

Our Special Breezey!

Our special Breezey !

Our special Jodi (RIP) & Jak !

Our special Jak !

Our Special MIlly !

Our special Jodi (RIP)!

Click To GO !

Our Special Maddie is our newest baby, we got her at the beginning of february 2010. We recieved a call from a very prestigious sales saying that she was going for meat ! She was ours for £100. The person who phoned us about her has known her for all her life as a racehorse. She is a 15.2hh chestnut mare born in 2006. Maddie would have lived the life of luxury with no expenses spared until she just didnt preform well enough & ended up off to the knakers yard, she is one of so many. We are finding her to be such a sweety, she gives us no trouble at all & is adapting really well to the new life she has with us as a riding horse, she is begining to enjoy field time which she has never had before. We are going to keep Maddie forever & hope to do a bit of everything but I think dressage may be her thing as she has the biggest stride ever. We hope to rescue more like her through our other site www.special-equines.co.uk & re-home them as riding horses. If you would like a "Maddie" then plese contact us.

Our special Breezey is an absolute star to have overcome her past. We are not sure of the exact details but we know she was horrifically beaten, her eye was damaged so she is now blind in it & she was tied up with ropes which have left her really scarred all over her body & her little ears are torn. She is 11.3hh grey welsh section A and born in 1999 (approx). Breezey came to us more terrified than you can imagine, her only response was to rear up at you. With masses of love & tlc she now trusts us completely & has been broken to drive & loves it. We wont ever break her for riding. She has her funny moments & cant tolerate any agression or shouting at all, she likes her stable & loves fuss & cuddles (she is a real mummy's girl & will mostly only let Sarah catch her, unless she is desperate!). She loves children & is the quietest safest pony to handle/drive. We love Breezey so much & feel honoured she has allowed us in after what happened to her. We NEVER let anyone else look after her & will NEVER part with her she will stay with us forever.

Our special Jak is the big spotty dollop on the right, he is a 15.1hh appaloosa x cob born in 2004. We bought Jak at 4 months from a field with 6 other big horses, no grass, no food & no mummy ! He was a wreck and very very underweight, riddled with lice & very timid having been chased endlessley round the paddock. We had to feed him milk & haylage as he barely had the teeth to eat & feed caused him to break out in a sweat. We had to make him a tiny rug to keep him warm & we became his parents. He is a wonderful boy allbeit a little headstrong at times. He has been a challenge to break in & loves a good argument. He is now begining to settle into work & spent a year driving which helped him settle down. He is being only ridden now & we hope to get him out to some shows with all four feet on the ground. (he does think he is a stallion). Jak will stay with us for life, I dont think anyone else would put up with him !!!

Our special Milly is the only one of our babies who we didnt rescue. She is a 13hh welsh x new forest blue roan mare born in 2006. We bought her at 7 months so she has been with us for most of her life. She has been lightly broken to drive but proved a very speedy girl so is now with one of Jay's little pupils to learn to be a riding pony. She is doing brilliantly & proving a safe but fun ride. We are not sure if we will loan Milly out or sell her on when she returns to us in a years time !!

Our special Jodi has a very sad story, we had to have her put to sleep in January 2010. She was a 15.2hh bay Thoroughbred mare. We bought her with little history but knowing she was un-broken & had never raced. We bought her in october 2009 & in those few months we broke her in & she was wonderfully well behaved, she came in lame from the field one day & we called the vet & after bone scanning her we learnt she had a shoulder fracture that had occured 2 years previously & had now dislodged & was beyond repair due to the arthritis & scarring from the initial injury. We made possibly the hardest desicion that we have ever made to let her go as she would never be able to be turned out without masses of painkillers, she was going to get worse & worse to the point where she would be completely crippled. We loved her too much to do this to her. Poor Jodi, if someone had treated the initial fracture two years ago she could have lived a full life as a riding horse instead of the 5 years she had. No-one had even given her a name when she came to us & we only wish we could have kept her pain free for longer. Like Maddie she is another sad case from the world of racing !!