Rider Fitness

I have a friend who is getting back into her riding again like me, and for the past year she has been riding Western.  She just recently moved to a new city to start a new program at university, and she's decided to start taking lessons at a hunter jumper barn.  Obviously, both of us are pretty excited because it seems like a really nice barn, and I think that it would be amazing to learn to jump in that type of environment.  Yesterday she had her first lesson, and it was also the first time she rode English.  When she called me that night, she was exhausted!  Although it was her first lesson, the instructor had them working at all three gaits, posting at the trot, doing turns on the forehand, and even doing two-point!  That's an awful lot of stuff to do in a first lesson, especially your first lesson riding English.

Lately, I have decided that I am going to switch primarily to English as well.  I will still probably ride Western in my lessons (at least until Winter), but I am going to try riding English more often outside of lessons.  This is because English is hard, and like my friend found out the other day, it takes a lot of work.  I find that English exhausts me, and this is for a number of reasons.

First of all, I don't usually post when I ride Western (because I try to perfect Walker's nice Western Pleasure jog).  Posting itself is not too difficult, and I don't have problems picking up the correct diagonal.  The problem is that I've spent the last 6 months teaching Walker to jog, not trot.  So when I want to post, I have to constantly push him forward into a nice trot, which means that I'm constantly squeezing him to remind him.

Second of all, I practice my two-point.  Two-point is hard.  It's hard to stay balanced, and it's hard to not simply pinch with the knees.  I made a valiant effort today to even try two-point at the canter, but that didn't work out so well.  Two-point is hard enough as it is, but then I also have Walker the Western Pleasure horse who likes to drop his head.

This picture is a good example of what Walker and I should look like while doing two-point but don't.  First of all, I am using as much strength as possible to hold myself up out of the saddle, but I am unable to grab onto any mane for any period of time.  This is because Walker's head is not nearly this high.  Instead, he drops his head when he's behaving, and he almost always drops his head when he's cantering.  I have nothing to grab onto because I will simply slip forward over his neck.  Now, most people can do two-point without grabbing mane, but since I'm only learning, I could really use the extra support - especially when we're cantering.

Lastly, English is difficult because I wear my English spurs.  And this means the world of difference to Walker and me.  As mentioned before, Walker is very strong, and it takes a lot of leg muscle to get him to do anything - especially canter.  And this is when I'm wearing big western spurs!  When I put on the little English spurs, I can almost hear Walker laughing as he happily ignores me driving my leg into him and kissing for him to lope.

All these factors together make riding English very exhausting for me, but because of this, it is great practice.  If I can develop enough leg strength to control Walker with smaller spurs and improve my balance because I don't have the safety of the Western saddle, I am bound to improve when it comes time to ride Western.  That being said, I had to remind myself today that the things that I am able to do in my Western saddle may be slightly out of my reach for awhile until I can gain that strength.  So although I am usually able to canter Walker in nice circles on his good side, I could barely get one circle out of him today.  Similarly, I had no chance whatsoever of getting him to lope frantic corner.  But all in due time.

Needless to say, I've decided that rider fitness is important.  Obviously, you get very strong when you work with horses and already I find that I am much stronger than I was pre-Walker.  However, I need to get stronger.  I have decided to incorporate some strength-building exercises into my nightly routine.  My nightly exercise routine currently consists of sitting on the couch and watching TV, so by "incorporate", I mean I will actually try to have an exercise routine.

In the meantime, I think it is safe to say that both my friend and I are feeling the pain today!