Kelli Metcalf

Owner/Head Trainer

Kelli Metcalf created Shamrock Horsemanship Academy in 2004 after relocating to Fort Collins, CO from Scottsdale, AZ. Horses have been her lifelong passion, and SHA is the culmination of her years of experience in training, instructing and showing. This includes volunteer work with Horses Help, a well respected therapeutic riding organization, volunteer work with the International Society for the Protection of Mustangs and Burros, four years as a wrangler/instructor at the YMCA Chauncey Ranch horse camp and three years in show barn management at Dynamite Dressage Stables.

During this time period, Kelli took lessons with well respected trainers and competed in both western and hunter on her own horse, a half arabian named Whiz, in addition to other privately owned horses. She put many hours of hard work and dedication into Whiz's training, and under her loving guidance he went from an impossible-to-catch pasture pony who liked to goof off on trail rides to a lovely and successful competitor in both hunter and, more recently, western. He also became a rock solid and trustworthy lesson mount. Whiz turned 26 years old in 2009 and he still takes great pride in taking children safely through their first lessons and bringing them home their first blue ribbons. He exemplifies Kelli's beliefs that kindness and mutual respect are paramount when training horses, patience and perseverance can go enormous lengths, and that there are certain times when you can indeed teach an old dog new tricks.

Kelli obtained her AAS in Equine Science from Scottsdale Community in 2002 with honors, and in 2003 she passed the American Riding Instructors Association certification test in the areas of Stock Seat and Recreational Riding. That same year she began work for a large riding school in Scottsdale at Pretty Penny Ranch and later Camelot Farms, where she taught riders of all levels in both western and hunt seat. Her responsibilities there also included teaching the City of Scottsdale introductory horsemanship classes, supervising summer day camps and coaching at local shows. The two years she spent at the school gave her the perspective she needed to ensure that SHA would be run not only as safely as possible, but would be as fun and as productive as possible as well.

Upon relocating to Colorado in 2004, she began work as an equine instructor and preschool teacher for a Montessori school and that summer became an instructor and day camp leader for Equinox School of Riding. She also began teaching lessons, leading trail rides and training horses at a small ranch in Fort Collins, and separately working as a trainer's assistant at a nationally competitive multi-discipline Morgan show barn. The experience she gained in Colorado was invaluable to her as she rode everything from Warmbloods to Quarter Horses to Fox Trotters, and was hugely inspirational to her. Upon Equinox's closure that year, Kelli was able to obtain the horses and equipment she needed, and finally made Shamrock Horsemanship a reality.

Being a true Arizona girl at heart, Kelli returned to the Valley in 2005. SHA had gotten off to a good start, but Kelli and her ponies had gotted their fill of snow. She reopened Shamrock Horsemanship in Gilbert, AZ and was appointed the 2005 AZ state representative for the American Riding Instructors Association. In 2006, she was honored as the first runner up Trainer of the Year for the Arizona Pinto Horse Association and was delighted to win the same award for 2007. In 2009, she was appointed secretary for the East Valley Arabian Horse Association.

Since returning to Arizona, Kelli has been able to reach many of her goals with SHA. Her small herd expanded from three horses to six, and SHA's current facilty at Rogers Ranch in Lehi is overflowing with happy clients and their horses. The riders and horses she trains compete and win regularly on the local open circuits and have gone on to many wins at class A Arabian shows. She has helped many of her students find the right show mount and has guided children she started in beginner lessons on a longe line years ago all the way up to wins in open championship <br><br>classes. She enjoys the new challenges each day places before her and her ponies, and looks forward to the many more successes that time will inevitably bring to her show team. On the flip side, she takes an equal amount of joy in the non-competitive side of the sport and feels blessed to have the opportunity to share with riders young and old the enrichment that horses can bring to the lives of the people around them. Maintaining that foundation for her school is the goal she is most proud of reaching each and every day.


 

Kendra Keener

Instructor and Trainer

Kendra was honored to join Shamrock Horsemanship Academy as an instructor and trainer in January 2008.  She's excited to have the opportunity to share what she has learned through her life-long obsession with horses.

A Colorado native, Kendra's been riding for over 22 years, and started training horses 15 years ago. 

Her riding career started at age seven, when she learned the basics of classic hunt seat equitation on a beautiful, and very patient, Arabian mare.  After outgrowing that horse, Kendra's next mount was a three-day eventing horse.  As payment for exercising the horse, she was provided with weekly jumping, hunt seat, and dressage lessons with a National's level Arabian trainer from the famous BARA Farms.

In addition, during her summers living in Monument, CO, Kendra worked at a riding program called Wings Like Eagles, which works with children that have learning and behavioral problems, often stemming from broken homes or abusive situations.  An unique program, it focuses on teaching participants the basics of riding and horse care, along with teaching them how to do vaulting (gymnastics on horseback).  The program also prepares participants for competitions in hunt seat and lower level jumping at Morgan shows, as well as vaulting competitions. 

After middle school, Kendra's family moved to an area of Colorado where she was able to finally fulfill her dream of having a horse to call her own.  The particular horse she fell in love with was an Arabian, and definitely a project animal that had been abused and had a lot of "baggage" from his previous owners.  In addition, he had been used for speed events, and Kendra wanted to show him in pleasure classes, so she had to re-train him to slow down, relax, and listen to his rider.  He turned out exceptionally well, and she and Zeffer were a familiar sight around Southern Colorado, where she showed him for many years in 4-H and at open shows. 

The two of them earned numerous high point awards for both English and Western divisions, including achieving a top ten overall ranking for western disciplines in the state of Colorado.  She later used him as a lesson horse and he took another young rider to top ten overall in Colorado for the hunt seat division.  Kendra is proud to say that they showed primarily against quarter horses and paints, beating several world champions in the classes that they had won their titles in, and also were known at the open shows for frequently beating all of the local trainers in difficult pattern classes such as trail. 

Because Zeffer had previously been a problem horse, Kendra got a reputation around the area for being able to work well with difficult animals, and was given a few to train.  She's worked with everything from a gaited Saddlebred, to working with a horse that was notorious for flipping over backwards with his riders, to teaching a driving horse to abandon his trot and finally canter under saddle, to training show horses, to working with horses for families to just use and enjoy.  In return for some of her training, Kendra was also given the opportunity to further her knowledge by attending clinics put on by well known dressage and western pleasure trainers. 

Throughout high school, Kendra also worked for Red Canyon Arabians, helping with breeding and foaling out mares, and working with halter breaking and training young stock.  Kendra then attended Colorado State University to double major in equine and animal science, and while she was there was a member of both the hunt seat and western equitation teams, where she had the opportunity to compete against other intercollegiate teams across the country. 

While in Fort Collins, Kendra put on clinics for 4-H kids covering everything from halter and showmanship to western pleasure and horsemanship/equitation.  She also had an opportunity to judge a few open shows in the area.  In addition, she continued to train and ride horses of a diverse variety through this time, as well as teaching both hunt seat and western riding lessons.  After moving to Arizona, Kendra worked exercising saddle seat trained Arabians, Half-Arabians, and Saddlebreds for a National caliber trainer, and gave lessons to beginning students, in return receiving saddle seat lessons. 

Eventually, she decided that wasn't her type of riding - or training methods - and left to return to her first loves of riding hunt seat and western.  Not long after that, Kendra met Kelli, founder of Shamrock Horsemanship Academy, and they began a friendship that ultimately culminated with the addition of Kendra to the program. 

In addition to training horses and teaching lessons as a proud part of Shamrock Horsemanship Academy, Kendra also spends about a month during the summers working in Oklahoma for Circle C Ranch Company, a large quarter horse breeder, where she halter breaks the babies, and helps with training and fitting the yearlings for sales.  Kendra also works for large quarter horse shows, such as the Redbud Classic and the Scottsdale Sun Circuit.  Kendra has always appreciated the athleticism and diversity that horses have to offer, and has enjoyed competing in just about every discipline, from lower level dressage to team penning to speed events to hunt seat to western pleasure to quadrille.  When not busy teaching lessons or training client's horses, Kendra enjoys training and showing her own paints and quarter horses.