By Laura Scaletti
Portraits by Kacy Brown
Horses have always been a family affair for Anna Marek. As a child, Anna and her mother took lessons together at the local barn where her mother had ridden as a teenager. Now a mother herself, Anna is sharing her passion for horses with her children, James and Mae, on their family farm.
Anna credits her family with helping her achieve her equestrian goals and dreams as a dressage professional. “Even though my family’s not all huge horse people, they’ve helped me so much in not feeling ‘mom guilt’ while training and traveling for competitions. They’re just so supportive and always jumping in to help with the kids or whatever needs to be done,” Anna said. “The little things they do for me are really huge, because it’s how I’ve been able to concentrate and do what I need to do to be successful.”
Training and showing dressage horses since 2001, Anna has had success from the start as she worked her way to the top of the sport. From winning her first regional championship in 2008 to making the short list for the 2024 Paris Olympics, it’s been a series of incredible rides for Anna as she keeps checking the box on so many of her dressage dreams.
Early Rides
Anna got her start riding at a hunter-jumper barn thanks to her mom. The duo enjoyed weekly group lessons together, until one day Anna was put on a horse that was a bit too much for her to handle. “I fell off and got scared. My mom, like all horse people, wanted me to get back up on the horse. My dad wasn’t a horse person, so he didn’t see the need for me to get back on or go to the barn until I asked to do so,” Anna said. “We didn’t own a horse at that point, so swimming lessons and other activities filled the void while I didn’t ride.”
Almost two years later, one of Anna’s elementary school friends had a Quarter Horse and invited Anna out to the barn for a ride and some horse time. “That’s how I got back into riding. I went out and rode her Quarter Horse with her and we just goofed around like kids do with horses and ponies. My parents then leased me another Quarter Horse that was at the barn, and it was a summer full of trail rides and just enjoying being with horses,” Anna said.
Some of Anna’s favorite memories with horses as a kid were made in her friend’s backyard. “She lived in a subdivision on a lake in Michigan and her mom would sneak her pony to their house. She’d set up a makeshift fence, we’d ride the pony bareback and just camp out there with him. He was our best friend,” Anna said.
With the love for horses rekindled, Anna’s parents bought a Quarter Horse cross, Zak. “Like any other kid, I thought I wanted to jump because that’s what all the other barn kids were doing. We went to a combined training schooling show, where they had dressage and jumping. I won the dressage and then fell off in my jumping class,” Anna said.
With an unwilling jumping participant, Anna was at a crossroads in her riding as she wanted to keep her horse, but he didn’t enjoy jumping like everyone else’s horses. “One of my mom’s friends said, ‘Why don’t you keep doing dressage if you’re not going to get a different horse?’ I thought to myself, Well, I’d rather win blue ribbons than fall off and be scared,” Anna said.
That’s how Anna’s full-time dedication to dressage began: She loved Zak so much that rather than find a new mount that would fly over fences, she pivoted to a discipline they could succeed at together. “He was only able to make it to Third Level, but I did get my USDF Bronze medal on him. When it was time for my next horse, we found Zak a good home and kept track of him. In his final years, he came back to live with us, and we took care of him until the end,” she said.
Cinderella Story
When Anna was in high school, she kept her horses at a boarding barn. In that barn was a beautiful 5-year-old black Dutch Warmblood gelding, Unico G, who was too strong for his owner. “The owner of the barn suggested I start riding him, since his owner was afraid of him. I got on him and the rest is history; we just clicked. He was my first horse for everything—my first Prix St. Georges horse, the first horse I ever won a Regional Championship on, and the first horse I rode at Grand Prix,” she said. “We both learned together along the way.”
Together the pair made their way to the top of the sport. “He was the first horse I ever did a CDI on. We won at the CDI3* FEI Grand Prix Freestyle at the Adequan Global Dressage Festival and at the Kentucky Dressage Association in 2013,” Anna said.
The fact that Anna was able to go so far with Unico is truly a Cinderella story. “Once I got him to the Prix St. Georges level, his owner, Amy Awerbuch, wanted to sell him. She told me that I needed to buy him, but at that point my parents had bought two horses for me. In the grand scheme of things, they weren’t super expensive horses, but even cheap horses in ‘real people’s’ terms are expensive,” she said. “I told her, ‘I don’t have any money. My parents aren’t going to buy another horse for me.’”
Luckily for Anna, Amy said they could figure something out. After owning two horses that she didn’t click with nearly as well as Unico, Anna went back to her father to formulate a plan to make Unico hers. “My dad said, ‘Why don’t you ask her if you could have a couple of years to pay him off? We’ll give her some money now and then we’ll put together a contract that details a payment plan to get her the rest of the money,’” Anna said.
Anna and her dad’s business proposition worked. “I think we came up with a two-year payment plan. Considering I’d already shown him at Prix St. Georges and he was still young, he was priced dirt cheap. Amy literally did that just so I could afford him,” she said. “I’m so thankful to her. My partnership with Unico was really special and he was so impactful on my career.”
To pay off Unico, Anna bought a 2-year-old, broke him and sold him. With Unico her own, she then moved down to Florida to take her first professional riding job with Belinda Nairn. “Belinda helped me train Unico the rest of the way up to Grand Prix and I began to take lessons with Anne Gribbons on him,” she said.
Anna Marek Dressage
From Anna’s earliest days in the saddle, she always dreamed of being an equestrian professional. “I did OK in school, but when you’re not really interested in something, you have a hard time focusing on it. I could do school and succeed, but my heart always knew that I would wind up doing something with horses,” she said.
Anna was in college when Belinda offered her the job down in Florida. “Looking back, I probably broke my dad’s heart at the time, but he told me when I went down there to treat working for Belinda like it was my horse college. He said, ‘Don’t worry about making money; learn how the business works because if you’re really going to do this, now is the time to concentrate and learn how to do it the right way,’” Anna said. “He’s always given me the best advice over the years.”
Belinda was a great role model to work for, as she had a big business importing horses from The Netherlands and selling them in the United States. While working for Belinda, Anna developed a clientele and eventually branched off, creating her own Anna Marek Dressage in 2013.
Once on her own, Anna realized she didn’t particularly love selling horses. Her real passion was developing horses and riders. “Training horses is why we all get into this business. That’s what makes us fall in love with the sport. I love starting young horses and seeing them develop to the best of their abilities,” she said. “I truly love training horses; I actually enjoy that aspect more than competing.”
Anna has trained nine horses to the Grand Prix level and many others to FEI. “I still ride and show my 3- and 4-year-olds. I think being a good young-horse rider is just as important as learning to ride Grand Prix,” she said.
Today, in addition to having her own family farm, Anna operates a barn for her clients. “After riding my horses in the morning, I head over to the other barn where we have a mixture of clients—from horses in full training with me to those that I either ride a few times a week or give their owners lessons on,” she said. “It just depends on what my clients want, but most of the time I’m riding in the morning and then teaching lessons in the afternoons.”
Part of what makes Anna’s business a success is the relationship she’s developed with her longtime coach Anne Gribbons, who’s helped Anna since she moved to Florida. “Anne’s not just a coach, she’s also a mentor, and throughout the years she’s always been in my corner. I can call her at any time and she’s always there for me whenever I need her,” Anna said. “She’s followed me all over the world and put her life on hold to help me achieve my dreams.”
Working with Anna has been inspiring for Anne, too. “During our journey, we’ve started and brought four horses to the Grand Prix level together,” Anne said. “Anna’s the ideal student—incredibly talented, trusts the information I give her and works on it when we aren’t together. As a trainer, it’s so nice to see her progress and the results over the years. Anna’s wonderful to teach because her attitude is so positive. Best of all, she is still the same Anna, focused, kind, humble and open minded. Always willing to learn more and open to new challenges.”
Kacy Brown Photography
Ocala, Florida’s Equestrian Photographer
Dreams Come True
Anna had a whirlwind period from fall 2023 to summer 2024, when she traveled the world not just chasing but achieving her dreams. Anna made her debut championship appearance for Team USA with her mount Fire Fly at the 2023 Pan American Games in Santiago, Chile, where the duo brought home team gold and the individual bronze medal in the Grand Prix Freestyle.
“I was so happy to be part of the Pan Am team that I really went in there just hoping I would have good rides and make my team and all my people proud. When we won the bronze medal, with a personal best of 81.305%, it was an absolute shock and huge surprise,” Anna said. “I don’t know that I will ever have that feeling of pure joy, like kid joy, every again. It still gives me chills any time I talk about it. It was the most amazing day!”
After her success in Chile, Anna took her other CDI Grand Prix horse, Fayvel, to the FEI World Cup Final in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, after her client, Cynthia Davila, suggested she give it a go and compete him. “Anne and I always saw a ton of potential in Fayvel, but he was Cynthia’s horse and I had plenty of horses to ride. That all changed at dinner one night when Cynthia told Anne she thought Fayvel was excelling at the Grand Prix movements and I should compete him. So, we gave it a shot,” Anna said.
That shot ended up resulting in them qualifying to represent the United States at the 2024 FEI World Cup, and Anna and Fayvel ended up as the highest-placed U.S. combination in ninth place. From there Anna made it onto the short list for the 2024 Paris Olympics with Fire Fly and had the opportunity to attend training camp with the team. While success and opportunities seemed to come fast and furious for Anna and her horses, she’d worked for years to open those doors.
“I really love what I’m doing training horses, and I get so much joy out of it. I’ve always said if there is some big event going on like the Pan Am Games or Olympics and we’re rolling and clicking and we can go out and beat some people, then of course let’s go for it,” Anna said. “It’s great to compete when we’re at the top of our game, but at the end of the day I do this because I love riding and watching the horses progress.”
Family Affair
When not training horses and clients, Anna can be found doing her favorite thing—being a mom. Living on a farm, James and Mae don’t have to sneak ponies into the backyard like Anna and her friend did; they can just head down to the barn to see their horse friends.
“I always said I wasn’t going to force my kids to ride and I wasn’t going to get a pony until they wanted to ride. When James was 4, he decided he wanted to ride so I put him on my horse Holiday, who was very sweet and calm. Then I put him on a lunge line and James just bopped around at the trot on this huge horse,” Anna said. “Holiday is a big horse, so it made me a little bit nervous.”
As fate would have it, Anna received a message out of the blue asking if she’d like a well-trained Miniature Horse for her kids. That’s how Pasha the Mini came into their lives.
Much like Anna as a kid, James has just as much fun on the ground with Pasha as he does on his back. “That’s how you build passion: it’s by creating the relationship with horses. Sometimes James will ride Pasha for five minutes and then he’ll want to spend time leading him around the farm, giving him a bath and just hanging out with him,” Anna said. “I love that he’s having the same experience becoming friends with horses as I did growing up, because in the grand scheme of things, riding is such a small part of being a horse person. Now that James’ legs almost touch the ground while riding Pasha, we’ve gotten him his second horse, a 20-year-old mare, Lena.”
Anna hopes the horses shape her children like they have her. Of all the lessons learned in the barn, Anna believes patience is the one that carries over into every aspect of life. “If something isn’t going right, whether it’s with horses or the kids, rather than trying to get a quick fix today, I’ve learned to take a step back, relax and wait for tomorrow. In the heat of the moment you want to fix it so badly, but having the patience to stop and really think through the problem gets you so much farther when dealing with both horses and children,” Anna said.
Anna’s support team is what makes everything tick when managing her horses, business and children. “I have the best help in the world! When I was pregnant with James, my parents bought a house not very far from us and then my mother-in-law moved to Florida as well. That’s how everything works; there is always someone to help with driving or watching kids,” Anna said. “The kids are so used to having Grandma, Grandpa and Alma around, when I’m off competing, they aren’t sad that I’m gone because it’s not a huge change to their lives; everything stays the same because their grandparents are so involved all the time.”
As Anna looks toward the future, her focus remains the same: Be the best mom and horsewoman she can be. “I want to buy a few foals, raise them at my farm and develop them. I’ll continue to enjoy training and showing horses, and if a horse comes along that can be a team horse in the future, that would be incredible,” Anna said. “I felt so proud to be representing my country, and being part of a team with such camaraderie was an absolute blast. I’d obviously love to do that again!”
For more information, follow Anna on Instagram @phylbot07 or visit marekdressage.com
Photos by Kacy Brown, kacybrownphotography.com
