Hitting Your Stride -- The Equestrian Elements Life Coaching podcast with Tracey Mitchell

The new discipline of Working Equitation is starting to grow and gather a new following in the horse world, and Lise Leblanc is on the front lines of that growth in Ontario. Lise, a long-time teacher in the educational system, joins the Hitting Your Stride podcast in this episode to talk about that and so much more. Their conversation opens with Lise's memory of a book called A Little Black Po...

In an interview that highlights another behind-the-scenes heartbeat of the horse industry, Tracey has Marie Labrecque join her for a touching episode of Hitting Your Stride. Marie, the groom, barn manager, and property manager at King's Grant Farm in Caledon shows off another side of her -- horse advocate. It's been a long road for Marie, arriving in Ontario from her Quebec home where she...

Dr. Robert Schinke joins Hitting Your Stride for today's episode, and we hit some new heights in our quest to engage the equestrian world with information that will help them see goal-setting in a whole new way. Robert has a long history with elite-level equestrian competition, peaking with back-to-back appearances on the Canadian Pan-Am team in the discipline of eventing. Robert went from riding...

When was the last time you faced adversity and how did you handle it? Did it change how you see your life and how you live day-to-day, or did you just chalk it up to 'lessons learned' and move on? For Megan Robinson, she's been meeting adversity head-on most of her life ... and she's now the one dishing out the lessons because of how she's handled it. Megan is the owner of The Movement Connection,...

If you're mucking out stalls, muck it out the best you can. While that wasn't the only message from Karen Leeming in this episode of 'Hitting Your Stride', it serves as an effective encapsulation into the career and the life of the Footing First partner. Host Tracey Mitchell and Karen explore what led her to filling a niche in the equestrian industry, what came before that and how her equestrian w...

And now Tracey knows what it's like being on the other side of her podcast! Victoria McCourt, Tracey's cousin, fellow horsewoman and owner of VEM coaching, stepped in to interview Tracey and helped her talk about the Hitting Your Stride podcast and how its grown in two-plus years of welcoming some of the equestrian world's biggest names and those who devote themselves behind the scenes ... entrepr...

Welcome back and welcome to the first episode of Hitting Your Stride in 2023! Today, Tracey welcomes event rider Holly Jacks from Holly Jacks Equestrian. She's coming off a 2022 season that saw her and her partner, Candy King, represent Canada at the 2022 World Championships in Italy, and she gives Tracey a peek inside the world of someone who's been coming on strong for the better part of two dec...

Hitting Your Stride is about sharing stories with great energy behind them, and what better way to celebrate the 50th episode than to talk with Laura Fournier of Annie Jay Equestrian. If you don't get inspired by Laura's story and enthusiasm, then you need to check yourself for a pulse! After giving birth to twins, Laura wanted to get back in the saddle again and resume riding... only to find that...

How often does someone's passion find its spark from a Grade Three class trip to a horse farm? For Chet Martin, that's exactly what got him going down the road to becoming a world-class competitor and trainer in the reined cow horse discipline. That trip showed him about horsemanship, which in turn led him to begin writing his own book about the craft of horsemanship and training ... and now, desp...

So how did you celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Royal Winter Fair? Hitting Your Stride took the show on the road and spent time getting up close and personal with people at the show, hearing their stories about all things ranging from how things have been since the Royal last held its annual event to how they felt coming back or coming to one of the the equine world's biggest shows for the f...

In her own words, Claire is living her little girl dream every day. Joining Tracey for this episode of 'Hitting Your Stride' is Braecrest Farm's owner/operator/trainer/breeder Claire Hunter. The young equine lover and entrepreneur is making a name for herself and Braecrest Farm with her unique way of training younger horses, gaining the trust of some of the industry's big names in helping get thei...

Tracey welcomes Maya Markowski back to 'Hitting Your Stride', as the coach and driving force behind Equest Dressage catches the podcast listeners up on her Olympic goals and how she's been working towards making them a reality. Maya talks about keeping her objectives in perspective and how she's taking things as they come throughout this process. Preparing for a trip to the Pan Am Games in Santiag...

In this episode of 'Hitting Your Stride' Tracey learns from Yvonne Losos de Muñiz about earned knowledge and the many forms it comes to us all in. Yvonne, a dressage rider originally from Nigeria but who now represents the Dominican Republic, has been adding to her knowledge base for the better part of 20 years and a lot of that has been learning on the go. Some of the key principles that she shar...

Lauren Hayes is hitting her stride in this episode of Hitting Your Stride. The child of Olympic rider Jay Hayes, Lauren joins the podcast and shares with Tracey what it's been like for her to grow up in that orbit and how she's blazed her own trail in a multi-generational family with equine roots that run deep. Recalling her days as an up-and-coming junior rider that saw her collect some pretty bi...

Even for the most dedicated equine athletes, there are things about being a farrier they don't know. Brian Mullins CJF ASF, owner of Mullins Farrier and host of the Mullins Farrier Podcast, joins Hitting Your Stride to shed light on all of the big and small things that go into being a farrier and what specifically led him down that road. He talks about his profession being good for the soul and ho...

Tracey crossed into new territory in this episode of 'Hitting Your Stride', as she welcomes Caleb Clingen to the show. A well-known and highly respected multi-discipline horse trainer who also happens to be an elite barrel racer. This first-generation horseman provides the foundational training they will eventually need, regardless of which discipline they are ridden in. A horse is a horse - diffe...

In as wide-ranging a conversation as Tracey has had with any of her guests, Erynn Ballard makes a thought-provoking appearance to take the podcast to the next level. The women cover the gamut of topics with easy candor, going from how riding is both a passion and a job at the same time and you need to love both sides of that coin, to dealing with the realities of an injury that could very well hav...

Emotions are heightened at the start of show season, as ambitious goals, nerve-wracking fears and struggles to accept failure are all part of the immediate future for riders. And Kendra DeVos (MSW, RSW) will be facing that this season, as she and her horse, Gigi, take on the Silver Series at Angelstone. But as a qualified therapist, Kendra is adept at identifying certain techniques to deal with al...

As horse people, we volunteer willingly to throw a leg over a 1,200-lb. animal knowing that nothing of what could follow is going to be easy. They test us, and we know that test is coming. Yet for some, they struggle to learn how to bounce back in the face of a challenge. Being an equestrian requires a strong reflex to get back up when you fall, putting that one foot forward again to get it right...

Picture sitting in the saddle and thinking, 'Can I actually do this?' just as the first show of the season kicks off. One thought after another is racing through your head, questioning if you have what it takes to complete the goals that you set out for yourself not that long ago. In today's 'Hitting Your Stride', Tracey shares those exact thoughts about a goal she laid out for herself a year ago...

Anyone who knows Tracey's guest in this episode of 'Hitting Your Stride' knows the word 'passionate' doesn't even begin to describe him. Dr. Steve Engle, veterinarian and equine chiropractor, can't ever seem to quench his thirst for knowledge. When he was first introduced to the new modality of equine chiropractic in 1995, he talked about continuing to learn and wanting to understand every aspect...

In this episode of 'Hitting Your Stride', Tracey takes a deep dive into the world of eventing rider and coach Lesley Grant-Law. This Canadian-born equestrian now calls Ocala, Florida home, where she and her husband Leslie Law operate Law Eventing. Lesley goes into great detail about her life in and out of the horse world and doesn't hold back on some of the lessons she's had to learn. Brought up b...

Meg Krueger, the CEO of Equestrian Canada, joins Tracey on the podcast and takes listeners on a proverbial ride through the peaks and valleys of her career and life as an adventurer and an entrepreneur. Proud to call herself Canadian, the head of our country's governing body for equestrian sport has tapped into knowledge bases both at home and abroad to strengthen and improve EC during her time as...

In this episode of Hitting Your Stride, Dr. Mike Pownall (DVM, MBA) joins Tracey for a spirited discussion on the state of equine veterinary care in the industry and how he as co-owner of McKee-Pownall Equine Services is seeking to change things for the better. This is pretty far from where Mike thought he'd be, having grown up a city kid in Montreal with no interest in horses -- until a thoughtfu...

It's not often you get the chance to have a conversation with someone who helped shape a sport for an entire country, but Tracey had that very opportunity in this episode of Hitting Your Stride. She welcomed six-time Olympian and three-time PanAm gold medalist Christilot Boylen to the podcast to share her lifetime of experiences -- from learning how to learn in the most foreign of circumstances, h...