My saddle does!!

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Equipment in any sport is important.

When I’m not perfecting the art of Bad Eventing, I’m a Snow Boarder.

I was actually a snowboarder before it was cool to be a snowboarder. (Yes, I’m that old.)

Back then I was also the one and only GIRL who snowboarded.  I won’t deny that I
enjoyed the cat calls when they eyed my pigtails as I headed down the mountain.

I’m a bit better at riding the mountain than riding a horse, so I’m really not sure why I haven’t just moved to the mountains and become a ski bum.

I suppose that’s always Plan B if this eventing thing doesn’t work out for me.

As a snowboarder I learned just how important equipment is. The right length and width of board, with the right stance width and angles, not to mention boots, gloves, helmets…….it’s all crucial to a good performance.

When it comes to high level equestrian performance saddles are even more important (at least for us mere mortals.)

I figured this out with my jump saddle a couple years ago.

The difference between this position

and this position

was the saddle.

Seriously……………… it was like night and day.

                             OLD SADDLE                                                  NEW SADDLE

When I changed jump saddles, for the first time ever, I could stay with my horse over the jump and land over my feet. It was a huge revelation that I wasn’t as bad as I thought. I was just bad at choosing my equipment!

A few months ago I was told during a dressage lesson that my balance was terrible.

Don’t get me wrong………………………… but I’d never heard the words BALANCE (when referring to the rider at least) and DRESSAGE in the same sentence.

Really??

How can you have a balance issue in dressage?

Don’t you just SIT there???

Recently (thanks to a rather poor show performance on my part), I had the joy of a no stirrups dressage lesson.

It went rather well actually.

And I had some pretty big unh huh moments about ……………..well…………….balance.

Today I rode in a different saddle, because it’s the one that fits the horse. And I found myself falling forward, falling backward, and fighting to put my legs in the correct place.

I tossed my stirrups away trying to replicate the feeling I had in my lesson, and even without stirrups it was impossible to sit with my legs underneath me.

It was a huge epiphany as I finally figured out that my dressage saddle has been hampering my progress as much as my previous jump saddle had.

And Bad Eventer starts out again on the never ending saddle search…………………………………….