About Havencrest Riding Academy
Havencrest is a public English riding school located within town limits of Oakville, Ontario. It is a division of Chris Delia Stables, a prestigious ‘A’ circuit hunter jumper Barn owned and operated by a former Olympian and one of Canada’s leading competitive trainers. Chris opened this school because he recognized a need for higher caliber riding schools that can offer a structured grass-roots system influenced by the “A” circuit level of training from the top-down (for more information on Chris Delia Stables, please visit http://www.chrisdeliastables.com/).
Havencrest implements a unique curriculum established by Chris and follows the model of the official Equine Canada (EC) rider level system (Rider levels 1-10). While the EC rider level system is quite comprehensive, the Havencrest system places greater emphasis on perfecting specialized skills required for “real-world” advanced riding in the future.
The instructors at Havencrest are all personally mentored and coached by Chris Delia and are committed to TEACHING as opposed to simply entertaining their students. While our instructors make every effort to keep the learning environment fun and stimulating, they want their students to experience the true gifts horses can give us. These gifts can only be unlocked through true learning and understanding the horse’s mind to a deep level. Horses teach us that we must bend ourselves first before they will bend to our wishes and commands. It is our goal to create horsemen… not riders.
A note from Havencrest founder Chris Delia
“Over the years most of my students came to Chris Delia Stables (CDS) from traditional riding schools and were looking to advance their training and compete on the “A” circuit.” Many had dreams of competing at the Royal Winter Fair, the North American Young Riders Championships and even the Olympic Games. I am proud to say that many of our students have accomplished their dreams and more. However, one of the biggest frustrations I found with many of them was that so many basic skills were either missing or taught to them incorrectly at the riding school level. The foundation upon which to build advanced skills simply was not there. I would literally have to “deprogram” most of the basic skills they were taught then “reprogram” them from ground zero. This was a lengthy process that would typically take between one to two years to finally get each student on the right track. Even after many years of advanced level training, old habits established in their formative days would still linger and sometimes never go away.
Many of my fellow ‘A’ trainers have voiced the same frustration and, like me, wished the students coming out of these schools were taught with more sophistication and given higher quality basics so that they could integrate more seamlessly into more advanced training systems. It was because of this lack of quality in our grass roots riding school system that I decided I would form a unique school with very high standards that would echo my program as a Grand Prix rider and trainer who made it to the Olympic level of our sport.
And so, during the summer of 2008, we proudly opened Havencrest Riding Academy. It is our goal to produce such well-rounded and polished students that they can go on to train and compete at the ‘A’ level if they so wish. If they decide to go on to explore other areas of the sport, I want them to have the skills, confidence and guidance to make a successful transition; whether it be to pleasure riding, Trillium level competitive riding, or even to another discipline altogether such as dressage or eventing.
I am very committed to the success of this project and will maintain quality standards by personally coaching the instructors as well as offering clinics to our students periodically as my travel schedule allows. I am also pleased that many of my past students have become an integral part of Havencrest and incorporate their skills and knowledge into our riding school program. I look forward to the future of Havencrest and all its students, as I believe we are truly setting a new standard in our industry.”
Chris Delia