AQHA Most Valuable Professional of the Year in 2015, Leslie Lange had a childhood that most in the horse world would envy. While citified and suburban Americans spend millions of dollars each year at guest ranches to have the true Western experience, this champion horsewoman actually lived it. Growing up as one of seven children on a cattle ranch in Woody Creek, Colorado on the western slope near Aspen, Leslie was in the saddle at the age of two. Her father trained and sold horses, so they were an integral part of her life from day one. She recalls, “My Dad gave riding lessons to a group of women every week, and I remember sitting there, watching those lessons, and just absorbing so much through that experience.”