Private Dressage and WE Lessons with Reta Conner at KarMik Acres

Name: Private Dressage and WE Lessons with Reta Conner at KarMik Acres
Start: 2025-09-19T09:00:00-05:00
End: 2025-09-21T16:00:00-05:00
Location: KarMik Acres

Schedule

Fri, 19 Sep, 2025 at 09:00 am to Sun, 21 Sep, 2025 at 04:00 pm

UTC-05:00

Location

KarMik Acres | Crystal Lake, IL

Very limited space for Private Lessons with Reta Conner. Lessons are dressage or dressage applied to progression in Working Equitation. Riders must be able to confidently walk, trot and canter and must be serious about their progression. Pre-registration is required.
Private lessons are Friday, Saturday and Monday. One Day Group clinic is scheduled for Sunday.
Email [email protected] for registration information.
Other dates for 2025 include:
Sept. 19-21
Oct. 31-2
* more dates may be added
Event photo taken at Andalusian World Cup.
A little about Reta:
Reta owns and manages Ponderosa Performance Horses, in Black Canyon City, Arizona. Her family has an extensive background with horses, and she was raised on a large cattle ranch in northern Arizona. As a teenager she galloped race horses prior to school and by 16 had her trainer’s license with several winning horses in her stable. During this time, she also participated on the high school rodeo team. She competed successfully with her three-day event and dressage horses, as well as her AQHA reiner. She was invited to ride in the horsemanship program at a private liberal arts college during high school where she met Belinda Nairn-Wertman, a future two-time Olympic Dressage rider, as well as Pam Goodrich who subsequently lived and trained in Portugal with Nuno Oliveira. Pam first introduced her to classical dressage and the Lustitano. Reta quickly grasped that dressage was the training foundation for all equine disciplines.

Reta moved to Pennsylvania and worked for Gunner Ostergaard, an international dressage trainer/coach. During this time, she trained one of her horses, a quarter horse, to Prix St. George. She moved to Germany to manage International Sporthorse Center. Belinda was preparing for the 1984 Olympic games while Reta managed the barn, took responsibility for riding and training the sales horses, and started the young competition horses. While there, she studied with Betsy Steiner, George and Inga Theodorescu, and Anne Gribbons. She has also trained with Jan Eblling, George Williams, Karl Mikolka, Christine Taurig, and continues to train with Belinda Nairn Wertmann.
After returning to the United States, Reta moved back to Arizona and purchased her own farm. She imported horses while competing nationally in dressage and began a warmblood breeding program which successfully resulted in well-trained marketable dressage horses at the top levels. She has been successful in the International Young Horse Program with several home-bred offspring.

During a trip to Portugal in 2011 to visit friends and purchase several Lusitano’s for clients, she was exposed to Working Equitation. It was a fascinating and impressive sport because it was based on dressage principles with the history of cattle handling. She started researching the sport upon her return to the States, and in the spring of 2015 she was invited to the first trainers’ symposium in California with Nuno Matos. Subsequently, she has competed her 4 year-old Lusitano stallion, Galante CR, in several WE competitions, winning the Novice division at AWC in Las Vegas and the Ease of Handling at Hara’s Cup in Houston. Reta has won at the Intermediate and Masters level in WE. She has also shown some top mules in WE and Ranch Riding. Being Reserve Champion on a mule at AWC at novice level.

Reta maintains a small breeding operation with a select group of warmbloods and Lusitanos, as well as trains and markets dressage and WE horses. She clinics and coaches throughout the United States, and one of her leisure activities involve playing on her cutting horses.