Rachel Bedingfield

Natural Horse Keeping
As soon as Rachel started owning horses, she introduced principles from organic farming and worked out how to keep her horses as naturally as possible. She took them barefoot in 2000; gave them free access to grazing 24/7 and put them on a suitable forage-based diet. She began to run Courses in 1999 to share the experts she found with other horse owners who wanted to do the best for their horses too. She created her first charity, the Natural Horse Group in 2001, which eventually had over 500 members and ran a monthly programme of events, and many clinics and workshops. 

Her desire to share the good stuff with other horse owners led her to study equine nutrition in depth with the University of Lincoln. She then created her forage-feed consultancy business, advising owners on how to improve their horse's nutrition. 

Connection  Training 

Connection Training is unique in that the focus of all the work is on creating a happy, relaxed, responsive horse. who is strongly bonded to her human. The objective is for owners to foster a strong and caring bond with their horse, while also having fun doing all the usual horsey activities. Much of their work is with rescue horses and centres, where they train and support staff to use positive training methods, without fear or force. The work is strongly grounded in science and Rachel is responsible for bringing the science into the teaching. This has led her to study modern neuroscience in order to understand the emotions of horses and how to foster the good-feeling emotions in training and horse-life. 

In November 2019, the Connection Training book, authored by Hannah and Rachel was published. This immediately went to the top of the Amazon Bestseller list in its category. It has sold all over the world and has received excellent reviews, such as: "This is a positive training encyclopedia with enough science to satisfy but importantly lots about how to turn your training into an art. A book I will refer students to in future."

Positive Horse Training Spain
Since we held our first Course in September 2017, Rachel has taught many clients and worked hard to rehabilitate our rescue horses. The Connection Training book features many case-studies and training examples from our Centre, taken from the first three years. Rachel is achieving her dream of founding an equine rehabilitation centre who's work and example will reach people all over the world. She is especially delighted that her Charity will be able to support other equine rehabilitation charities thanks to the generous donations of our supporters.

"Had a wonderful time. It's taking relaxation to a new level. Thanks so much, Rachel."
Helene, The Netherlands

"Because of Connection Training I have been able to achieve a relationship with my horses which I previously could never imagine. Thank you Hannah and Rachel."
Sophie Pickard, UK