Training & Certification as an Equine Assisted Coach
Help people to live their true selves authentically and from the heart.
RETREAT – Journey to your true self
October 25 - 31, 2025, Barão de São João, Algarve/Portugal
Profession of the new age
Horses connect in ways that often cannot be expressed through words, but are well understood by our hearts on a deep level. Horses bring us into our hearts and feelings. Horses are living mirrors and therefore powerful partners in personal development.
Equine assisted coaching uses the power of horses to mirror people and initiate change.
You want to learn this healing work with horses? Supporting people in their process together with horses? Develop yourself and live your potential?
Then this training is just right for you on your way.
Instructor
Anna Kerckhoff de Sacchi
For more than 10 years now I am certified as EquusCoach and accompany people together with horses in equine coaching. I love this work and it gives me great pleasure to teach and pass it on myself. Since the year 2019 I offer the equine assisted coach training with us in Portugal. I call my “method” Cavalo Coaching, from the Portuguese Cavalo = horse.
In the training you will learn how to deal with horses and people in a respectful and trusting way in the context of equine assisted coaching. You learn and experience which practical exercises are applicable in which context.
Content of the training
- Horsemanship & Horse Knowledge: Equine psychology, horse behavior, social behavior, instincts, herd rituals.
- Language of horses, non-verbal communication
- Reading and understanding horses
- Safety aspects in the work with horses and coachees
- Mindful and conscious interaction with horses and people
- Coaching: Theory and Transfer
- Coaching with the Work of Byron Katie: Theory and Exercises
- Neuroplastic Basics & Heart Brain Coherence
- Meditations
- Practical coaching exercises with horses
- Self-reflection and feedback round
Requirements
To start training, you should have relevant experience with horses and ground work / communication. If this is not the case, participation in the preparatory horsemanship course is a prerequisite (we can clarify this individually in a discussion in advance).
For those who have little or no experience with horses, there is the option of an additional basic course.
Furthermore, you should already have experienced equine assisted coaching as a coachee. If this is not the case, participation in the Cavalo Coaching Retreat or at least 5 individual coaching sessions is a prerequisite.
Another prerequisite is the willingness to work on one’s own issues and to enter into an open exchange with the other participants based on trust and respect.
RETREAT – Journey to Your True Self
Date TBA, Barão de São João
Join Up® & Horsemanship
May 10-11, 2025 (English), Equus Ourique /
October 11-12, 2025 (German), MRLCE, Bamberg
Dates of the training
Training dates 2026 in English in Portugal:
1st week of training
May 18-22, 2026
2nd week of training
October 26-30, 2026
Location: Cavalo Coaching, Barao de Sao Joao, Portugal
max. 6 participants
Training dates 2026/27 in German in Germany:
1st week of training
expected September 2026
2nd week of training
Expected April 2027
If you are interested, please contact us and we will inform you of the exact dates when they are available.
Location: Monty Roberts Learning Center Europe (MRLCE), Bamberg, Germany
max. 6 participants
Training costs
Price of education in Portugal:
€3.800,00
Price of education in Germany:
€4.400,00
The price includes:
– 2 training seminar weeks at intervals of 4-12 months on site in Portugal or Germany
– 6 online seminars
– Completion & certificate
Price excluding 23% VAT.
exclusive accommodation and meals
Is it your dream to do this training and help other people with the help of horses, but the costs are too high? Talk to us for an individual solution.
Who is the training for?
– Coaches, counselors & therapists (m/f/d)
– Interested parties with horse experience
– Interested parties without horse experience can attend appropriate courses to get started.
– No riding experience is necessary
Procedure – 6 Online Seminars
After the first week of training, we all meet regularly online for exchange, supervision and mutual support. All participants are invited to conduct practice coaching sessions with coachees starting in the first week of training. These are presented and discussed as examples.
There are 6 online appointments of 1.5-2 hours in length.
Conclusion and beginning
In the second week of training, in which what has been learned is deepened and practiced, the prospective coach leads a coachee through a coaching session.
After a successful coaching session, each participant receives a certificate as an equine-supported Cavalo Coach. It is also possible to use the internationally recognized logo of the EAHAE – International Association for Horse Assisted Education for a reduced fee.
This is the completion of the training and the beginning of your own equine assisted coaching career. Even after graduation, I am available for questions and supervision. Furthermore, there is the possibility to gain further experience as an assistant at my seminars. No one is thrown in at the deep end and left alone. The herd and I as the lead mare are always present.
Find your
Certified Cavalo Coach
Béatrice Esser (in Anna's team), Barão/Portugal
Béatrice Esser, Cavalo Coach
About me
Name: Béatrice Esser
Born: 1983 in Germany (NRW)
Resident in: Portugal, as of 2019
Mother tongues: German, French
Other languages: English, Dutch, Portuguese (basic knowledge)
I have been in close contact with horses since childhood. My natural curiosity about life and interest in the well-being of people and animals is still with me today.
That’s how I came into contact with Anna and her horses in the summer of 2021 and had the great fortune to experience the herd up close for six months. In 2022 I then successfully completed the training as an equine assisted coach with and by Anna. Since then, I have been offering individual coaching and one-to-one support both on site with horses and by telephone.
The wealth of experience I have gained over the years, working with people and animals, forms my trustworthy and solid basis for this wonderful work.
As a coach, I support you in a protected environment, with an open ear and without judgment, to guide you towards your personal solution! Do you feel addressed? Do you have a request? Do you want to know more about me? Feel free to contact me!
I look forward to seeing you!
Contact: +49 – 1631775312 (WhatsApp, Telegram)
Christine Stelzer, near Göttingen, Germany
Chris Stelzer, Cavalo Coach
For a long time I have worked with horses and people in different ways and in 2019 I have added Cavalo Coaching training to my repertoire. I not only apply the knowledge I learned in the training in coaching contexts, but it also helps me in my work as a riding instructor. Horses mirror our inner self. This helps us in our own reflective and further development. They mirror us in every interaction. Thus, the origin of many a training or riding difficulty lies within people, which the horse mirrors. My goal is to accompany encounters between people and horses and to help both to grow together and to feel an intimate connection.
Contact: Tel +49- 15159171565 (WhatsApp). Email: ChristineStelzer@gmx.de
Conny Kadia, Portugal (Coimbra)
Conny Kadia, Cavalo Coach in Central Portugal
Conny Kadia, née 1965 in Germany, lives in Portugal since 1992 and works with horses since 2003. After a career as a professional musician, in 2020 she dedicated herself to her passion with horses and now offers Equicoaching in her new project “Mondequus” – Connection Training (MCT) near Coimbra in Portugal.
“Horses are fantastic for reconnecting with nature. They have very healthy and honest instincts, horses can lead us to our roots. Equicoaching is a perfect combination for individual and group coaching in private and professional life to find blockages and release them naturally!”cke
Since 2006 Conny Kadia has completed courses in Natural Horsemanship, has taken lessons in traditional Portuguese riding, has worked part time at various riding arenas, and does trail rides with her own horses.
In 2022 she has certified for “Equine Assisted Coach / Equicoaching” with instructor Anna Kerckhoff de Sacchi in Portugal/Algarve.
Since then she has been successfully working with people, her program includes the following training:
Equicoaching;
– individual and group coaching
– workshops Natural Horsewomenship
– home visits for training of horse and human in their region…
More information about Conny Kadia: www.connykadia.com
Marie Thimm, near Hamburg
Training to become an equine-assisted Cavalo Coach 2019
More information to follow
Lahja Engelmann
Training to become an equine-assisted Cavalo Coach 2020/21
More information to follow
Alena Sidow
Training to become an equine-assisted Cavalo Coach 2020/21
More information to follow
Natasha Surkemper
Training to become an equine-assisted Cavalo Coach 2019
More information to follow
Xenia Rautenberger
In my vision I see a space – an invisible space in which everything is allowed to be what is. In which everything that is in us is allowed to come up. Without rating. Without judgment. It is a space of silence. The acceptance. The unconditional love. In this room, laughter is no better than crying. Peace no better than unrest. In this room there is nothing to do and nothing to achieve. He is carried by the deep realization of how perfect simple being is. How perfect you and I and the world are. In this space, the question resonates: Who am I – really? I see a space where people discover fullness in emptiness. In which feelings are allowed to flow. In which every thought is allowed to show itself freely. And because horses are masters at all that, I see them in this room. Connected with us humans – in simple existence.
Contact: x.rautenberger@gmail.com
Sarah Weick
Sarah Weick, Cavalo Coach
Mein Name ist Sarah, ich wurde 1983 geboren und wohne in Mainz. Ever since I can remember I have felt the strongest connection in nature, especially in contact with animals and in open-minded exchange with other people. This has also had a significant impact on my private and professional career. As a biologist, I have been leading ecological field studies for many years and have also furthered my education in coaching, communication, nutrition and Natural Horsemanship.
Through my training with Anna to become a certified equine assisted coach, it was immediately clear in my heart that this is where I would focus my efforts. In my experiences with horses as co-coaches, I always feel pure fascination and appreciation towards these sensitive beings.
For me coaching is to accompany you on your way TO and WITH yourself. Projections, fears, self-doubt, as well as old programming and thought patterns can spread like a fog inside us and cloud our vision. As a coach, it is important for me not to set up signposts for you, but to support you in clearing this fog. What do you need for a clearer vision? Self-care to boost your self-esteem or courage to be authentic? Communication and expression training to strengthen your effectiveness in interpersonal relationships? Even one-time coaching sessions, with or without a horse, can be very effective and great fun.
I look forward to hearing from you in German or English via email to sa.weick@web.de or via Whatsapp at 0049 (0)176 62670358.