Mandy bought her first horse when she was 15 years old. Her uncle was known as the local "kill buyer" and often had horses others were giving up on. From the age of 4, Mandy stayed part of her summers with her "Uncle Rusty" and the first animal she rode there- was a goat. Her brother would halter whichever horse was catchable and put Mandy on whatever horse would stand still (no halter, no saddle, no bridle) and they would spend all day riding horses across rugged terrain in the hills and creek beds in Somervell County, TX.  When she was 15, Rusty had a 2-year-old horse from the horse sale that had been abused, but Rusty knew she deserved a chance from slaughter. However, this little mare was so dangerous, Rusty told Mandy to "stay away from that one." The filly was a granddaughter of Go Man Go with appendix papers. She had long legs, and was terrified. If anyone tried to approach her she would come at them with teeth or turn to kick them. The second day there, Mandy had the horse eating out of her hands and Rusty sold Mandy this horse, who shared the same name-Amanda Shiner-to her for $150. Her mom agreed to pay for one month of training with the local horse trainer everyone knew-Shelly Stewart. Shelly became Mandy's first mentor. She taught her how to start colts, how to work cattle, how to "buck them out" and how to dig deep for grit. Eventually she would learn there were better ways to train a horse, but those years with Shelly would help Mandy have a well-rounded understanding of horses and probably the most important lesson from that era-how to not get bucked off. It did not take long for Mandy to know that all she really wanted to do was train horses. Mandy and Shelly remained friends until Shelly passed away in 2012 leaving Mandy her prize stallion. Shelly wrote Mandy a letter sharing her story of her life and how she saw that same grit in Mandy and encouraged her to continue on as a woman in this cowboy world because she believed she had a gift, and the grit,  that she had seen in only a few people, and believed she was created for this. Mandy carries the letter in the glove box of her pickup to this day.  

 

This mare, now called "Mitzi", would teach Mandy patience, how to fall from a horse, how to care for a pregnant mare and foals, and even earned her a barrel racing scholarship to a junior college-and they were TERRIBLE. They never once placed, but lessons were learned, and the fire inside was building. In 1995 Mandy and Mitzi left Texas and traveled to Estes Park, Colorado where together she worked as a wrangler on a guest ranch called Wind River Ranch, where they lead people on horseback through the Rocky Mountains. Little did she know that her boss, the person who became her next mentor, would soon be sought after all over the world. At the time he was a new author, and soon to be world-renowned trainer, Mark Rashid. She had her first official riding lesson at the age of 18 here. Mandy worked under Mark for several years on the guest ranch, was part of a search and rescue team, learned to train and drive teams of horses, and on the side-learned how to fix problem horses and train wild mustangs.

 

Under Mark, Mandy learned to start every horse at liberty-no halter or bridle from first catch, to first saddle, to first ride-and not one of them ever bucked. She learned that by letting the horse have a choice to stay or walk away, when they chose to stay, a foundation of trust was built. Under Mark's guidance they gave local clinics with these mustangs, were featured in magazines and he even put her in his book "Life Lessons of a Ranch Horse." Mark would inscribe in one of his books to her "Of all the people I have taught over the years, you have the most potential to take everything I have taught you-and run with it. -Love, Mark-Rocking 5R"​From there Mandy went on to college for a while but was buying and training and selling horses on the side to pay for a degree she was not super excited about, so she dropped out and headed to Northeastern Junior College to get an Equine Management degree and worked under reining trainer Ken Amen. Ken taught her how to hone in on all parts of the horses body under saddle to to really get them soft and supple. Her horsemanship was growing. Her accolades at the college earned her the highest trainer reward of getting the top bred colt to start her final semester. Ken and the other students had watched Mandy start all her college horses at liberty and thought she must have just had easy horses. This little Pistol Annie cutting mare was wide eyed-or as Mandy calls them "hot bred and hot fed." Once again, Mandy fully started her at liberty as her instructor and fellow students watched in amazement as none had ever seen anything like it. With humor, when something amazing happens with one of Mandy's horses she throws her hands up and yells "I'm the greatest trainer in the worrrrlllddddd"-even when it's just her and the horses and no one else around. Mandy is also known to push the clock to the last minute, arriving on time, just not early. So, her end of year award was "The Latest, and Greatest Horse Trainer Award" with the tag line "We all know she's the greatest trainer in the world-now if we can just get her to show up on time." (For the record, she was never once actually late.)​To finish out her degree Mandy had an internship program and this landed her at Ray Gibler's cutting horse ranch in Ft. Lupton, CO. She and one other trainer were riding 40 horses a day and caring for twelve mare/foal pairs that had ran through a barbed wire fence and had to have wounds scrubbed and doctored daily, and ride the 4 cutting horses that were currently in the show pen along with giving a drench to around 60 brood mares. She also assisted in semen collection and shipping and embryo transfers to "recip" mares. Mandy was also the on-call person at night for mares going into labor. The work was exhausting, but she got to start a LOT of horses and learn the breeding side of the industry. Little did she know this would lead to riding with Martin Black. While Mandy had learned to work colts from another horse with Shelly, what she learned from Martin took this to a whole new level, and to this day Mandy has a "using horse" to help her start every horse she works with.

 

​Mandy eventually moved back to Texas in 2002 and started her own horse training business. She has worked with horses of every breed including draft horse teams, Arabians, racehorses, cutting and reining horses, ponies, donkeys, mules and everything in between.

 

In 2013 she competed in her first mustang competition with three wild mustangs for the Mustang Million. Since then Mandy has competed in many Extreme Mustang Makeovers and In-Hand mustang competitions where she gets a wild mustang and has to train them in just 100 days. Mandy has made the top 10 finals, was reserve champion in an in-hand comp and in 2024 The Grand Champion of the Extreme Mustang Makeover at the Mustang Spectacular in Tennessee.

 

Today Mandy has her own way of helping people and horses from the accumulation of the people, experiences and thousands of horses she has helped over the last 30 years. She is very excited to turn the page and start passing on her knowledge via clinics and lessons with people and their own horses, help people find the right horse, and continue helping horses as she has always done. Of every person and every horse she has worked with, Mandy accredits the mustang the most for helping her connect with a horse on a level she could only dream of as a little girl with dreams that started simply of one day owning her own horse...