Lauren Reischer was born with cerebral palsy, but she hasn’t let that stop her from reaching — and surpassing — her dreams. Having begun her equestrian journey doing therapeutic riding in order to teach her brain how to use her legs separately from one another, she went on to become a professional on the hunter/jumper circuit, a coach and an advocate for para equestrian sport. Reischer is also a board member for GallopNYC, the therapeutic riding center in New York where she first learned to ride.  

On May 30, 2025, Reischer, 26, achieved another major life milestone at the HITS Hudson Valley show series with her horse, Gold Standard (“Bravo”), by coming in first in the schooling hunter under saddle in the pro division against able-bodied riders. When the judge called her name and number to present her with the blue ribbon, Reischer said: “My jaw literally hit the floor.” Having looked over at her trainer to confirm she wasn’t hearing things, Reischer then collapsed onto Bravo’s neck and “started hysterically crying, and I mean ugly crying! With tears running down my face and soaking his braids.”   

When she walked out of the ring, her trainer, Harrison Thompson, her support crew including Hayley Mairano and Hugo Mcalpine, and the grooms at Halcyon Show Stables in Litchfield, Conn., were all cheering and crying. “We had a group hug and gave Bravo lots of treats,” Reischer recalled. “It was a very exciting and emotional day, and I could barely speak to them.” Thompson said that when Lauren was announced as the winner, “our groom jumped into my arms and took my radio that we used to communicate at the show and started screaming into the radio, ‘She won! She won!’”   

As a hunt seat jumping coach for Special Olympics NY, Reischer is more often at shows supporting friends and students with disabilities than showing herself. However, she decided on a whim to ride at HITS as she was going with her barn anyway and “felt ready.” Bravo, an 18-year-old Hanoverian-Thoroughbred cross, “was a bit fresh” when Thompson did a training ride on him when they got to the venue, “there were a few moments where all four feet were on the ground!” Reischer said, which made her nervous. Fortunately, when he came out the following morning, it was “like night and day ... he was a lot more responsive than I was used to. He's very bright and was being an angel,” she said. Thompson rode Bravo in a large, competitive flat class and although they didn’t ribbon “the horse went exactly how we would've expected and exactly how we wanted him to go the entire week,” so Reischer opted to enter the schooling hunter under saddle the following day. Before the class, Thompson told her to “‘just ride your horse ... go have fun.’ She just needed to take a breath and go enjoy herself out there,” he added.  

Reischer had some jitters going into the “big scary ring with a jumbotron” as it was her first show as a pro, but Bravo went exactly how he was supposed to. “He was right with me at every transition. He was really moving forward nicely. He wasn't looking at anything and he went exactly like he goes for me at home,” Reischer said.   

Bravo has been with Reischer since January, during which time “he has been a dream. We have a really strong connection. He nickers every time I come into the barn,” she said. Due to her disability, Reischer was more used to riding slow, sluggish horses, so having a horse that is so responsive was an adjustment. She has worked hard with Bravo on voice commands to make up for not having strong legs as she is always working on keeping her legs quiet and tight to the horse. “My left leg is strong and flexible, so I'm able to be really accurate with where I put it, but my right leg is tight. I wiggle it around a lot and a truly honest horse will start to leg yield or come off the rail because they feel the different leg pressures — not because I'm trying to yield them one way or another,” she explained. Therefore, she has spent a lot of time working with Bravo to keep her legs as quiet and tight to the tack as possible. “It has just taken me a while to find my center on him.”   

Despite her disability, Thompson has high praise for Reischer’s form and overall riding ability. “Her hands are always in the perfect spot. She has the perfect bend in the elbow — and even though she might be a little bit stiffer — the ability to hold that position, especially in the hunters, allows the horse to be free,” he said. Thompson has been working with Lauren for the past five months and describes Bravo as “a very lovely horse, one of the most comfortable horses I've ever sat on ... As long as he's maintaining his gait and natural canter, he looks lovely, and she looks perfect.” All the hard work they have put into him “culminated into going to this show, which is the first of many for us,” he said.   

Reischer, who also rides with trainer Kristi Lucarelli at Meadow Wood Farm in Schenectady, N.Y — which she describes as “a second home” —became a professional to train and coach riders with disabilities so that they can enter the show ring. “For an aspiring rider with a disability, having somebody like me as their trainer is a lifeline and it puts me in a unique position,” Reischer said, explaining that she didn’t want to sacrifice that opportunity to keep amateur status as she doesn’t show very often. “I have gone to a million shows in the last five years, but never on a horse's back, always at the in-gate. I’ve put my own showing aside for a long time, but now I have a horse in my program that I'm so in tune with, I'm very optimistic that there will be more shows in the future.” While she doesn’t plan on doing a full circuit, Reischer would like to do at least one more show this summer and not have such a long hiatus between shows again. “I'd like to get her to start jumping a little bit more, and this horse is more than willing to do that job,” Thompson said.  

On the professional front, Reischer began working for the United States Equestrian Team Foundation on April 1, 2025, as the director for annual support. “I'm working with people who I'm very familiar with and in a role that is really in line with where my career was taking me anyway. It is such a full-circle moment to raise support for the elite levels of the sport given my history working to support the grassroots” she said, adding that she has extensive experience in nonprofit development and fundraising.  

 

To learn more about Lauren Reisher and her equestrian accomplishments, read her story in the I Am US Equestrian article featured in the Summer 2024 US Equestrian magazine.