Come Work and Ride With Us

Greetings from the windy plains of South Dakota!

My name is Jenn Zeller — the trainer/creator of Outside the Turn – Building Better Barrel Horses. I live on The DX Ranch, located between Gettysburg and Eagle Butte. The ranch is home to a grass-fed custom beef operation and a commercial cow/calf operation, as well as a 50 year old QH breeding program.

I’m here to offer you the chance at a life-changing opporunity!
Contact Us

Internship Opportunity: Foundation Building and Horse Training

We’re currently offering an ongoing internship for individuals looking to gain hands-on experience in foundation building, young horse development, and the day-to-day operations of a working horse training program. This is not a paid position, nor is it classified as an assistant trainer role—but it is an excellent opportunity for the right person to learn, ride, and grow in a professional environment.

What We Do:

Our program focuses primarily on starting colts for the public (foundation building), working with problem horses, and developing young horses we’ve raised ourselves. We also have a few up-and-coming futurity prospects in the barn.

What We’re Looking For:

We’re seeking a self-motivated, hard-working individual who is eager to learn and comfortable with a variety of ranch tasks. The ideal candidate should:

Have some colt starting experience (you don’t need to have started 100s—but it’s a bonus if you have!)
Be reliable and capable of working independently when needed
Have experience or be willing to help with client lessons and horse handling education
Be able and willing to assist with foaling, daily chores, fence/building maintenance, and basic vet care (IM shots, etc.)
Be comfortable operating ranch equipment (tractor, skid loader)
Bonus if you can haul horses (pickup + trailer)

Additional Details:

Interns may bring one horse, and we’ll cover feed and board
Housing is provided: a Yellowstone-style bunkhouse located inside the riding barn
You’ll receive 15 lbs of home-raised ground beef each month, and fresh eggs when available
You may have opportunities to travel with us to barrel races and clinics
While we prefer no dogs, if you have one, it must get along with other dogs and must not harm chickens

Important Notes:

This is an unpaid internship, but a valuable hands-on opportunity for someone serious about building skills and knowledge in the performance horse industry.
Non-monetary compensation totals a base of $2500/mo.

The Philosophy

Relationships are built from the ground up. Don’t we all want a good relationship with our horses? They begin the moment we catch our horse, to how we feed him, and how we interact with them on the daily: these things set the tone for our relationship. Building a better barrel horse is something I have strived to do over the past two decades. We firmly believe that the best horses are built “outside the turn”.
The barrel racing world could certainly use a little more “outside the turn” logic. Not another site full of “drills” to teach our horse the pattern. The more you know about how a horse thinks, the easier it is to create a language that we can use to become successful in our chosen field. Whether barrel racing, calf roping, trail riding or ranch work, it matters not. We’ve learned — over the past 3-5 decades of training horses and people — that we as humans tend to make things a lot more difficult than they really are.

The horse is never wrong. They can do what they think they need to do to survive the moment or they can do what they think we want them to do. They’re absolutely entitled to their opinion of how and what we present to them. It’s up to us to present it in a way that they can understand. We use a hybrid of Brannaman/Hunt, Martin Black, Curt Pate, Lee Smith, Ashley Schaffer methods and more – we take from them what we like, discard what we don’t, and go from there.

The Horse Training Program

We check every horse that comes to us, ridable or not, for any holes left by previous trainers. A well-rounded horse is best, so they all learn a solid foundation – cow horse turn-arounds, speed control from the seat, softness up and down in transitions, to honor the leg and the rein, how to handle being roped on, etc. Our instagram accounts are full of reels, sharing these things. If they aren’t soft laterally, we aren’t going to get much else done. We ride a minimum of 5 days/week (We try to keep the outside horses on a schedule). We feed 7 days a week, and we use Saturdays as makeup days for what we missed/didn’t get done during the week. We require a minimum of 90 days on colt starts, so we aren’t starting a ton of them yearly. Typically we only keep 5-7 outside horses here at once (as of now). We take nothing for only 30 days. A 60 day minimum is required.
Apply to Intern Now!

The Future

Outside the Turn University – a program that would share our barrel horse training philosophies with others. We put doing right by the horse first, winning second.
We also currently have an online horse training courses, a membership wherein people can watch us talk them through, unedited rides on horses and we offer group coaching through that membership.
Interns must Commit to Three months for this position to be paid. After 3 Mos, a 2 year contract will be signed. I will invest in you, if you invest in yourself.
One month internships are unpaid.
Summer Horsemanship School is a tuition based program – applications are due soon.
The plan is to create a curriculum and certification process for others to come learn these techniques and become teachers in this style of horsemanship/barrel horse training.

Get In Touch

Will you join me in this journey we call horsemanship?

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Testimonials

What Our Customers Are Saying!

“I came from Canada to stay with Jenn for 3 or so weeks. I brought my barrel mare, Mia. Jenn is one of the nicest, most caring people I know. She let me ride her horses and get the feel of what I wanted in my mare. She then rode Mia while I got to ride her horses. I learned so much from Jenn in a short amount of time. We went to jackpots together and she would give me tips for my next run. Even after I went back to Canada, I can still send my videos to Jenn or ask her questions when I’m struggling with something whether it’s with my new mare or my 3yr old. I will always recommend Jenn and if you have the opportunity to ride with her or sit and talk you WILL learn so much and won’t regret it. 10/10. ”

Taya O

Student

I first rode with Jenn at a clinic and learned so much in those few days I decided to intern for her over the summer. While interning, I gained so much experience and knowledge plus got to ride so many horses. Jenn even went above and beyond to help me with my own horse while I was interning and is still always there for me whenever I need her help. I never could have imagined someone could help me improve my horsemanship as much as she did in such a short amount of time

Bill N

Student

Jenn is always the first to help and give her advice on literally everything. She has a wealth of knowledge and is happy to share, or even just listen. She has an amazing program and is a true horseman.

Sharon M

Student