Welcome

Cat Hill has travelled far and wide in her equine career. Starting right here at Cinnamon Lake Farm as a child, she participated in 4-h, showed Arabians, and trail rode all over. In college at SUNY Geneseo, she joined the Equestrian team and rode the IHSA Collegiate hunters. Following college she took a gap year to Ireland and discovered racing, fox hunting and eventing. 

She then starting as a working student, first for a Grand Prix dressage rider, then to Advanced Eventers. She  spent 4 years as head groom for Olympian Mara DePuy, participating in US equestrian team trips and the Pan American Games. During her time there, She received lessons daily, and started the young horses. Mara is known for her thorough, correct, and kind approach, as well as her insistence on top-notch care of the horses. 

After leaving Mara's to come home and start a family, Cat freelance groomed for many elite dressage, Para-dressage and Event riders. Mara "retired" the amazing Nicki Henley to Cat, he was a notoriously difficult horse to manage and keep, and was also Cat's best friend. Through her care, Nicki was able to return to the ring, earning excellent dressage scores through 4th level with Cat, and even jumping at a couple small derby-crosses. She wrote a book on grooming with good friend and fellow groom Emma Ford. "World Class Grooming for Horses" has bee a best seller on the equine care lists for 10 years now, and Cat and Emma run a business called "World Class Grooming" teaching people about how to elevate their care and understanding of horses.

In addition to grooming, Cat began teaching and training locally at several facilites. She had a busy and full calendar of horses and riders until COVID hit, at which time she took a step back to focus on her family during the difficult inline schooling times. After covid, she and her husband Marc had the opportunity to buy her childhood farm and launch a business out of her own facility, with the goal of caring for each end of the equine lifetime. Starting babies in the same patient, thoughtful way she was taught, creating willing, happy horses, and caring for the show horses that spend their lived in pampered luxury and aren't quite able to transition to a typical retired life.