Hi, we're Jake and Amy Lundahl
For 14+ years, we’ve been perfecting the art of starting and retraining horses.
Here you’ll learn: Who we are, Who we help, What we do, and our Stories.
Who we are
As professional horsemen we train, teach lessons and produce instructional content. We offer simple, proven techniques that solve problems and make horses and humans better. We like helping people who approach horsemanship with an open mind and sincere desire to improve. Because that combination allows them, with our guidance, to achieve powerful cooperation with their horses.
Our mission is making advanced horsemanship accessible. What does that mean? It means training tools, exercises and techniques that are practical and effective. It means learning life-changing skills in a way that's fun and unpretentious. And it means breakthrough moments of understanding and confidence; realizing you and your horse can achieve far more than you previously thought possible.
We also aim to improve the public conversation around horse training, by disrupting an industry where old tropes, touchy-feely gimmicks, woo-woo nonsense and charlatan behavior abound. A better way exists. We share insights and steps to help horse owners discover it.
Who we help
We help horse owners, riders, and trainers working with green colts or horses that need a better foundation. We work with those who genuinely desire to improve themselves and their horses. These horse owners are motivated and their horses may have potential, but they lack the necessary techniques, systems, tools, time, or guidance to reach their goals.
Our ultimate goal is to help guide horse owners through the fundamental shifts they must make in their outlook and approach to horsemanship, in order to achieve their dreams. If you're looking for a trainer that will pat you on the back for what you're currently doing, and help you make a "tweak here and a tweak there," then you shouldn't work with us. We're not in the band-aid business. We're in the transformation business. We work with horse owners and riders who are dedicated to achieving lasting, long term results.
What do we do
We operate a 60-acre facility in northeast Ohio called Noble Farm, where we accept horses for training year-round. We also teach riding lessons, produce online training content, and occasionally travel around the country for clinics and private workshops.
On the personal side, we live in a little house just a few hundred feet from our barn. We're very grateful to have the setup we do, and to work with amazing people and horses every day. But it wasn't always like this. If you want to know how we got started in the horse world, here's an autobiographical snippet from each of us:
Jake Lundahl
From pen rider to performance horse trainer...
I grew up on my family's farm in northeast Nebraska, two miles south of a little town called Wakefield. My folks are in the feeder cattle business, so I was surrounded by livestock from a very early age.
As a youngster I participated in the usual sports and 4-H activities. I enjoyed football and baseball the most, and didn't have much interest in horses early on. My dad always kept at least one feedlot horse around to prowl pens and cut out sick cattle. But truth be told, we rarely used the horses except as a last resort when the job couldn't be done on foot.
That all changed when I was around 14 years old. My younger sister had been bitten by the horse bug. So my parents went out and bought a new gelding for her to show in 4-H. The horse was well trained in some respects. But from the day we brought him home, he was steadily becoming more pushy, disrespectful and difficult to handle.
After hearing about the troubles we were were having, a friend loaned us his collection of training DVDs from various clinicians. I was instantly hooked. I spent hours watching and re-watching the videos, taking hand-written notes, and practicing with my sister's horse and my dad's older gelding. There were immediate, positive changes in both animals. I was excited.
For the first time, horses were no longer an enigma. I was learning how to correctly interact with them, gaining more confidence in the saddle, and discovering how rewarding horsemanship could be.
My parents purchased additional horses soon after, and it was evident that I was destined to be a professional horseman. While still in high school, I worked with several local trainers to gain professional experience. It wasn’t long before I was taking in outside horses for training, teaching riding lessons, and traveling around the country competing in everything from stock horse shows to Extreme Mustang Makeover events.
In 2010 I left home for my first of several apprenticeships. I went from Oklahoma, to Texas, to Arizona. I rode under several prominent horsemen, including an NCHA futurity champion, a world-renowned clinician, and an NRCHA two million dollar rider. After 7 years of work and study, I felt I was ready to head out on my own. And Lundahl Performance was launched.
Amy Lundahl
From piano teacher to professional horsewoman...
I grew up on a small family farm in Kidron, Ohio. My love of horses began at age 9 when we purchased our first pony. It was one of several horses and ponies I would ride during my formative years. And I've been riding continuously ever since.
It wasn't always obvious that I was destined for a career in horsemanship. As a teenager, I was more interested in music. I taught piano lessons, and earned extra money through babysitting and housecleaning services. But I always had a desire to learn more about horses. By age 15, I'd saved up enough money to afford some training and lessons with a local horseman, who steered me toward additional learning opportunities. I took regular lessons with several trainers, and supplemented that experience by consuming every horse training book and video I could find.
Looking to gain even more knowledge, I took my first real job in the horse industry with a training barn in the heart of Amish country. When I wasn’t training horses under saddle, I was driving them in harness. My reputation grew, and I began getting requests for riding lessons. I would train and teach lessons during the day, and in the evenings I would ride with my local drill team.
I soon landed a second job where riding lessons were my primary focus. My love of teaching horsemanship really took off, and I earned enough money to buy and sell a few horses of my own. I still supplemented my income by teaching piano lessons, and continued riding and performing with my drill team every week.
By 2015 I was ready for the next stage of my career, and I left Ohio to begin a full-time apprenticeship position with a world-renowned horseman in Texas. After graduating, I kept training horses and teaching lessons around the country.
Two years later, I returned to Ohio for a short time. Then a new opportunity arose. I took a position on a ranch near Cody, Wyoming. For the next year I trained and oversaw management of the ranch remuda, while continuing my clinician business. Then at last, I joined Lundahl Performance.
Noble Farm
Bringing it all together
Like most horse owners, we come from humble beginnings. Horses were a source of struggle and confusion in our early days, and we bounced between various mentors looking for help. We read books, watched videos, rode in clinics and attended seminars. We were confronted with loads of conflicting information, and tried to sort out the stuff that actually worked.
It was like mining for gold — digging for the valuable little nuggets buried under mountains of rubbish.
Then as aspiring professionals, we saw a different side of the industry. We learned what techniques worked and genuinely helped horses and riders advance. We also saw things that didn't work, or in some cases sabotaged people's efforts to do right by their horses. We took all of these lessons to heart, and gradually our own horsemanship philosophy emerged.
What originally kicked off our journey was a simple love of horses, and a desire to become the best horsemen we could be. These things have never wavered.
But a weird side effect of becoming good at something is that, at a certain point, it's not about you anymore. A shift occurs where you stop focusing on yourself, and you start thinking more about how your skills can benefit others.
For us, getting to this level was like following a game trail through dark woods tangled in undergrowth. Now we're turning around and bulldozing an open highway back through it. Because a better way forward needs to exist.
What drives us today
Helping people build better relationships with their horses. Providing the knowledge and tools necessary to advance; without the trial-and-error, confusion and hardship we endured while piecing it all together.
If you'd like to join us, consider joining our email Newsletter. There's no cost or obligation, and it's a great way to discover if our program is right for you and your horse.
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Contacting Us
The best way to contact us is via email - jake@lundahlperformance.com
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