Nicole Weinauge, Licensed Trainer of the Ecole de Légèreté. Looking back at thirty years with horses and fifteen years of working experience, I was always aware how important it is, treating each horse respectfully and individually, considering its possibilities, to train it in a healthy way. As I was in the beginning of my career as a horse trainer, my wish was to get to a training where the result is the communication between the two partners, the horse and the rider, as well as their well thought through training for the well-being of the horse.

This is how I met Philippe Karl and his Ecole de Légèreté (School of Lightness) in 1999, which considers the horse's physiology and psychology thoroughly. I was both impressed and carried along by his devotedness to the schooling and the connection to the horses. His Theory about the horse's training, which is canoed with logical keys, is pioneering for me to this date. (Twisted Truths of Modern Dressage: A Search for a Classical Alternative).

Exactly ten years ago, I started my work at the School of Lightness. I had the opportunity to work with different horses in his open seminar, three times a year for over four years. As well, I started to change my training methods with my riding class and their horses. My students are enthusiastic to this day and they have found, just like me, exactly what they were looking for: a training by which to highlight that the naturalness of each horse is being taken into account, the respect of the horses individuality is the main thing. For each type of horse there is a plan for its gymnastic training and the maintaining of its health.

In 2004, Philippe Karl started the Ecole de Légèreté training seminars, the ones to which I was also admitted. In March 2007, I passed the exam for a licensed trainer at that school. At the time there are being held further training seminars.

With the possibility of working as a trainer in these devices, I have had many wonderful experiences with horses and people. I met riders that were facing problems they thought they couldn't solve. There were leaning problems, back problems, tension, tact ('feel') mistakes and especially problems with the communication. Now, after a few riding lessons or a seminar, these riders are capable of loosening their horse communicatively and of performing the exercise calmly, they can bring their horse to be more effective and to build on to more difficult lessons.

But especially, I could work with many horses that, with this kind of work, changed completely within hours and they transmitted me so much from themselves, that I count myself happy to have had the chance to understand them. It is possible for me to establish a way with them, to get them into the position of being able to carry the rider in all disciplines for a long time and also to understand the riders' signals and to realise them fluently.

I regularly give riding lessons and seminars in Schleswig~Holstein, Hamburg and Niedersachsen and also travel around all Germany and to foreign countries. At the beginning of this year I went to El Paso on the Island La Palma for the first time. There were German and Spanish riding students and interested ones that have discovered this kind of work now and train assiduously. In April this year (2009), I went for the first time to Perth City in the West of Australia. I gave two seminars in four days and was received with open arms. Even this far away, the enthusiasm for this work was inexorable.

So everybody, no matter what they discipline aspired to, is very welcome in my riding and horse training. If interested in tournaments or in the hobby training, in my concept of training, the result of working with respect and a good communication is the harmonious work in a health maintaining gymnastic training.

On the last night of Nicole's April Clinics, a dinner was held at Stewarts Restaurant. Pictured above right is Nicole Weinauge (centre) with Brookleigh Equestrian Estate owner Nikki Brook (left) and Sonja Johnson (Olympic Silver Medalist, Team Eventing, Beijing 2008).

Nicole Weinauge Clinics
Brookleigh Equestrian Estate, Upper Swan, Western Australia, 6069.
Group 1: 9 ~ 12 April, 2009.
Group 2: 15 ~ 18 April, 2009.

Website of Nicole Weinauge: www.nicoleweinauge.de

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