Introduction to Equine Massage Class

Introduction to Equine Massage (aka Equine Massage 101) is one of our most popular classes. The goal of the class is to provide students with an introduction about what massage is and how it can benefit themselves and their horses. Each class is designed to maximize and retain learning of the material by utilizing the three main learning styles visual, auditory, and kinesthetic.

Each class begins with a classroom component, in which hand-outs are given detailing what is covered in the up-coming class. During this time questions about homework, previous classes or general life experience are answered. Once students have had time to review the class material and had any questions answered the class moves into the Hands On phase, where horses participating in class are moved allowing everyone to study the various gaits of the horse. Students are taught insights into injury prevention by learning how to visually identify problems in equine movement and locate its most likely point of origin with Gait Analysis. To further integrate motion and movement of the horse, students explore and confirm with touch what they have just seen with their eyes. The class then practices the material in the hand-outs while under supervision of the instructor. In each class, students get the opportunity to see and touch a variety of different horses with different massage needs, muscle types and previous injuries. Class ends with another Q&A period, while watching the instructor provide professional massage to a horse utilizing techniques practiced in class as well as ones that will be taught in future classes.

In this class students can expect to learn: safety, correct posture when giving a massage, basic physiology and anatomy of the horse, gait analysis, receive exposure to a wide variety of different massage styles and the ability to practice those techniques on a number of different horses and ponies, be introduced to emergency massage, learn to identify basic problem areas and problem behaviors that lead to the most common causes of injuries in horses, and develop a new way to communicate and enhance their relationship with horses.