Equine sports massage as a career how did you do it

[spamiad]

Hi all,

I'm am thinking..... or rather needing a career change, I have always wanted to work with horses and despite doing all my Master saddler qualifications when i was younger getting a job back then was near on impossible.

I have since worked in the Transport sector I am now 35 nearly and extremely unhappy job wise.

I am unable to go and do a full time course, but have been looking at the Wolds course with a view to one day at least make a part time career.

those of you that use or are and Equine sports Massage therapist, how long did it take for you to build a client base ?

what are your earnings like either part time or Full time ? do they cover everything needed insurance etc.

How many horses do you do a week ?

this is more the career path i wanted to take when i left school, so I'm really wanting to look into this

would really like to hear from those who have been down a similar road and how you managed, before i takle the jump and pay for the course

 

[TPO]

My info is a bit out of date but here's what I did:

2008 I started the McTimoney-Corley course at Oxford. It was one full weekend a month on campus with course work in between and a signed off diary to show the hours of hands on done.

I hated it. The course leader was horrible and just kept telling the class how we'd never be as good as her ? they also showed a lot of Animal Aid videos for no real reason. A few of the other students left the room in tears at various times because of them.

Applicants were called for interview and I thought it was to find out your skill level but no, they just wanted to know that you could afford the course fees.

The other students included a vet, vet nurses, (human) physios and osteos. The human physio and osteo both Saif that this course was better and more in depth than their equine equivalent degree course.

In between course visits we had homeworking, assignments and log books to fill in. I'd return the following month and nothing had been marked or returned. One class they spent longer talking about PTS then anything to do with McT-C.

I left the course. I'd paid a few K to do it and was travelling from Scotland to Oxford and paying for a B&B to be getting taught next to nothing.

2009 I did a saddle fitting course with a brand

2009 I did the Equineology Equine Body Worker course. This was a 9 or 10 day course and I did mine in Wales.

It's changed a lot since then and you have a pre course to do and I think it's only in Essex at a college now.

So basically it was pay your money I think, I can't recall an interview but I think you had to write about yourself on the application.

I think we were a class of around 12 or 15. Out of that only one person probably "shouldn't" have been there. Iirc she was mid 30s but had only been having RS lessons and decided she wanted to work with horses. She was very nervous around the yard horses and just overall lacked experience and knowledge. I did feel sorry for her as she was totally out of her depth and had paid all that money.

We were given a big text book to print off and study prior to starting the course. So if this is something you are interested in get swotting up on anatomy and knowing all the points of a horse, different layers of muscles, the names of the muscles and points of origin etc.

We were based on an event yard for the training and did a good mix of class room and hands on. There was homework every night and lots of reading, so thr more knowledge pre course the better.

There was a day off mid course to revise too.

After the course you had to do 90hrs (I think) of logged massage. Be videoed performing the full massage routine. Paint the muscles on a horse and label them. Complete an assignment and do case studies on either 6 horses seen 4x or 4 horses seen 6x iirc. Submit that for your qualification and you became an EBW.

There were further courses to do to become an advanced practitioner and so on.

I did the course and then set about doing all my case studies.

I HATED it! Hands on with the horses was fine but unfortunately horses come with owners ? I am a big soft lump but it broke me seeing so many lame and sore horses with ill fitting tack and not fit enough for what was being asked of them.

A bit of that was probably because initially I was doing free massages for my studies and I guess these people would never pay so I wouldn't have seen them in normal working life iykwim.

I struggled with saddle fitting for similar reasons I.e. lame and sore horses

Back in 2009/10, in Scotland at least, any type of therapy was mainly viewed as a con and not needed. Not by everyone but by the majority on a lot of average DIY yards. Nowadays the market up here appears close to saturation but more keep appearing.

IMO anyone starting up now would be wise to be social media savvy and look to bring something new and unique to the table.

A good page to look at is Vet.Physio.Phyle on Instagram. Her neat handwriting and notes make a big impact and she sells them as ebooks along with groundwork, poles and stretching books. She also posts the progress with her own horse and to see that kind of improvement is a good advert for her work and knowledge.

The average charge is around £45-55 around here with some physios being slightly more expensive up to £70.

I can't remember what my insurance costs were but it was via NFU.

The people I know who set up doing equine therapies have all diversified. The physio from the McTimoney-Corley course went and did the equine physio course but obviously has has human qualification so spends a lot of time doing that instead.

A couple of massage and McT-C people I know qualified in human McT-C and massage. 1) business drops right off for horses during winter 2) it's cold and miserable working outside all day so they diversified to have an indoor option.

Most of the people I trained with have given up. Not entirely sure of all the reasons why but basically boiled down to the reality wasn't what they/we expected.

@MotherOfChickens did her EBW fairly recently so may be able to give you an up to date report.

In your shoes I'd look at saddle fitting. Massive shortage of good ones, high demand and there is a lot more money to be made from it than massage. However also having a therapy qualification helps because the more that a fitter knows about anatomy and function the better IMO

 

[spamiad]

My info is a bit out of date but here's what I did:

2008 I started the McTimoney-Corley course at Oxford. It was one full weekend a month on campus with course work in between and a signed off diary to show the hours of hands on done.

I hated it. The course leader was horrible and just kept telling the class how we'd never be as good as her ? they also showed a lot of Animal Aid videos for no real reason. A few of the other students left the room in tears at various times because of them.

Applicants were called for interview and I thought it was to find out your skill level but no, they just wanted to know that you could afford the course fees.

The other students included a vet, vet nurses, (human) physios and osteos. The human physio and osteo both Saif that this course was better and more in depth than their equine equivalent degree course.

In between course visits we had homeworking, assignments and log books to fill in. I'd return the following month and nothing had been marked or returned. One class they spent longer talking about PTS then anything to do with McT-C.

I left the course. I'd paid a few K to do it and was travelling from Scotland to Oxford and paying for a B&B to be getting taught next to nothing.

2009 I did a saddle fitting course with a brand

2009 I did the Equineology Equine Body Worker course. This was a 9 or 10 day course and I did mine in Wales.

It's changed a lot since then and you have a pre course to do and I think it's only in Essex at a college now.

So basically it was pay your money I think, I can't recall an interview but I think you had to write about yourself on the application.

I think we were a class of around 12 or 15. Out of that only one person probably "shouldn't" have been there. Iirc she was mid 30s but had only been having RS lessons and decided she wanted to work with horses. She was very nervous around the yard horses and just overall lacked experience and knowledge. I did feel sorry for her as she was totally out of her depth and had paid all that money.

We were given a big text book to print off and study prior to starting the course. So if this is something you are interested in get swotting up on anatomy and knowing all the points of a horse, different layers of muscles, the names of the muscles and points of origin etc.

We were based on an event yard for the training and did a good mix of class room and hands on. There was homework every night and lots of reading, so thr more knowledge pre course the better.

There was a day off mid course to revise too.

After the course you had to do 90hrs (I think) of logged massage. Be videoed performing the full massage routine. Paint the muscles on a horse and label them. Complete an assignment and do case studies on either 6 horses seen 4x or 4 horses seen 6x iirc. Submit that for your qualification and you became an EBW.

There were further courses to do to become an advanced practitioner and so on.

I did the course and then set about doing all my case studies.

I HATED it! Hands on with the horses was fine but unfortunately horses come with owners ? I am a big soft lump but it broke me seeing so many lame and sore horses with ill fitting tack and not fit enough for what was being asked of them.

A bit of that was probably because initially I was doing free massages for my studies and I guess these people would never pay so I wouldn't have seen them in normal working life iykwim.

I struggled with saddle fitting for similar reasons I.e. lame and sore horses

Back in 2009/10, in Scotland at least, any type of therapy was mainly viewed as a con and not needed. Not by everyone but by the majority on a lot of average DIY yards. Nowadays the market up here appears close to saturation but more keep appearing.

IMO anyone starting up now would be wise to be social media savvy and look to bring something new and unique to the table.

A good page to look at is Vet.Physio.Phyle on Instagram. Her neat handwriting and notes make a big impact and she sells them as ebooks along with groundwork, poles and stretching books. She also posts the progress with her own horse and to see that kind of improvement is a good advert for her work and knowledge.

The average charge is around £45-55 around here with some physios being slightly more expensive up to £70.

I can't remember what my insurance costs were but it was via NFU.

The people I know who set up doing equine therapies have all diversified. The physio from the McTimoney-Corley course went and did the equine physio course but obviously has has human qualification so spends a lot of time doing that instead.

A couple of massage and McT-C people I know qualified in human McT-C and massage. 1) business drops right off for horses during winter 2) it's cold and miserable working outside all day so they diversified to have an indoor option.

Most of the people I trained with have given up. Not entirely sure of all the reasons why but basically boiled down to the reality wasn't what they/we expected.

@MotherOfChickens did her EBW fairly recently so may be able to give you an up to date report.

In your shoes I'd look at saddle fitting. Massive shortage of good ones, high demand and there is a lot more money to be made from it than massage. However also having a therapy qualification helps because the more that a fitter knows about anatomy and function the better IMO

Thanks for the note, i don't really want to go into saddle fitting alone, there are some very good ones in my area, be near on impossible to compete with them

Maybe ill just have to stick my job for a lot longer, or until i win the lotto

 

[TPO]

Thanks for the note, i don't really want to go into saddle fitting alone, there are some very good ones in my area, be near on impossible to compete with them

Maybe ill just have to stick my job for a lot longer, or until i win the lotto

Thats just my experience.

I didn't "need" it as a job and I am/was a huge horse geek so knowing more about anatomy, function, feel etc was a huge plus without self employment tacked on.

Another point is that I am pretty lazy and not motivated by money (as in yes I want money but I don't want to give up my weekends for it!). I had quite a few good ideas (if I do say so myself) but in any context I'm not great on following through. My motivation drops off half way through most things.

If you're a driven and motivated person you won't experience the same thing. Lots of my "thoughts" have come to fruition via other therapists/fitters/tack shops having similar ideas. So there is space in the market to get yourself head and shoulders above others (see vet physio phyle- who is in Surrey I think, I've never met and have no idea in practice of her abilities but her social media is spot on IMO).

If its something you really want to do then give it a punt. The training (with the right people) is really interesting on its own. Again I know people who worked FT and did massage at weekends then built up to PT at their job before finally leaving. I would advise having a back up plan for your first winter.

Another therapist I know (Masterson, really rate it but super expensive to quality in and isn't, or wasn't, anatomy focused which made me wary of a few practicioners) is doing the distance learning vet physio course. I know three others that have qualified this way and they are all superb. I rate them over the ACAPT physios that's I've used.

If you want something don't let a stranger on the Internet put you off. It just isn't a walk in the park and without proper effort it's not as easy to walk out into a plethora of clients. The courses have become very popular in all fields.

What about lookin at something like bit fitting too? It's picking up popularity and there aren't too many of them around

 

[spamiad]

Thats just my experience.

I didn't "need" it as a job and I am/was a huge horse geek so knowing more about anatomy, function, feel etc was a huge plus without self employment tacked on.

Another point is that I am pretty lazy and not motivated by money (as in yes I want money but I don't want to give up my weekends for it!). I had quite a few good ideas (if I do say so myself) but in any context I'm not great on following through. My motivation drops off half way through most things.

If you're a driven and motivated person you won't experience the same thing. Lots of my "thoughts" have come to fruition via other therapists/fitters/tack shops having similar ideas. So there is space in the market to get yourself head and shoulders above others (see vet physio phyle- who is in Surrey I think, I've never met and have no idea in practice of her abilities but her social media is spot on IMO).

If its something you really want to do then give it a punt. The training (with the right people) is really interesting on its own. Again I know people who worked FT and did massage at weekends then built up to PT at their job before finally leaving. I would advise having a back up plan for your first winter.

Another therapist I know (Masterson, really rate it but super expensive to quality in and isn't, or wasn't, anatomy focused which made me wary of a few practicioners) is doing the distance learning vet physio course. I know three others that have qualified this way and they are all superb. I rate them over the ACAPT physios that's I've used.

If you want something don't let a stranger on the Internet put you off. It just isn't a walk in the park and without proper effort it's not as easy to walk out into a plethora of clients. The courses have become very popular in all fields.

What about lookin at something like bit fitting too? It's picking up popularity and there aren't too many of them around

Yes bit fitting is an option, i would also like to include working with canines in with this too,.

so much to think about, and yes it is something that has been bugging for quite intensely for 12 months or more now, but i am so fed up of my current job now, that i feel i need to do something about it, before I end up with no job because i have walked out

I do need the money, so the motivation is there more so I think, I already give my weekends up doing a job I hate, and thats on top of my Monday to Friday role

I'm certainly going to look into it, but i couldn't afford to give up work, it would have to be evenings and weekends to start with

 

[TPO]

Equineology used to do a canine qualification so their website is worth looking at.

Way back in 2009 "doggy daycare" and dog walking was starting to take off. I fitted a saddle for an owner of a "doggy day care" Centre and she was desperate for me to get thr canine qual so that she could offer another service

As you'll know dog ownership has boomed and there are more dog walking vans around my area than I have fingers and toes to count them on. Whilst the competitive dog owners and some working dog owners have long since used physios more pet owners are starting to.

Plenty of opporutinites to get in tow with a day care centre/dog walking service to set up a mutually beneficial working partnership too