Strider - WARNING, it's a big un

My brain aches is a good summary of the weekend.

This blog will most likely be very mixed up while I work through what I have taken away from it all.

For those reading this who have no idea what Strider is, he is a mechanical horse who measures the weight in the saddle (bounce rate), whether you're weight is in front or behind the horse's centre of gravity (ie whether you're tipping forwards or backwards), whether your weight is to the left or to the right, the physical amount of contact you have on the rein (ie should be 600g/1lb per hand) and whether they're even and also the drive you have on the horse (can be forcing ie pushing horse forward or stopping ie hindering the horse from moving forward).

Strider lives in a classroom where, once on, you have a very large mirror to your right, another large mirror in front of you and also a computer screen in front of you so you can see real time what Strider is feeling from you.

He's not perfect, there are little things he can't replicate like the head movement of the horse which ultimately does affect the rein contact line but he does a damned good job though. He allows you to think 100% about yourself - you don't have to worry about the canter breaking, you don't have to worry about steering, you can focus entirely on yourself and better still, Becky can be there next to you, physically helping you keep whatever changes you need to so that you can see/feel the difference it makes.

One of the big things I've taken away is that I am incredibly lucky to have the instructor I have, and to have had her for the last 8 years. Some of the tales being told were shocking but what I liked the most is that everything Becky was saying, was either the same (almost word for word) or just using a different analogy to what my instructor says.

I don't THINK my instructor is a RWYM instructor, she's "just" an instructor but obviously one who has her head screwed on lol.

My first and really ONLY thing that didn't quite tally with my instructor was the position of my legs, especially my lower legs as she tells me to put them on the girth. However, thinking back, I'm not entirely sure she does because when she says "legs forward" in all honesty, I shuffle forwards in the saddle, tuck bum under me and my thighs go forwards. I've interpreted what she's saying as putting lower leg on girth but maybe I'm not ACTUALLY doing that?

Methinks I need a video of my lesson!! Just looking back at photos of me riding T over the last few years and not once is my leg on the girth, my thigh is pretty much 45 degree angle to the ground and my lower leg is just behind the girth with base of my feet flat. (For those on facebook, look at the "T at work" album in my photos) Not sure whether my feet are "heavy" or "light" in the stirrups.

In summary, I need to:

• Really sort out my weight distribution as I am sat to the left in all gaits and quite significantly too. It's not so much about rearranging my physical self but about rearranging my weight. Need to constantly be thinking about feeling that right seat bone.
• Thighs at 45 degree angle to the floor
• Lower leg will fall just behind the girth
• Stirrups on the ball of my feet, not my toes. It makes a shocking difference to the weight in my stirrups and also means my foot is less "heel down"
• In order to keep my spine in neutral in walk, need to think about sitting back. I need to remember that little pendulum line on the strider screen.
• In order to keep that neutrality in canter, need to tip the pendulum forwards slightly.
• Bounce more in canter and especially in sitting trot.

I know most people probably think this but I really do think I can ride T better than I rode Strider lol. Or rather, T compensates for me a heck of a lot. Picking up on what was said to other people, I could relate to various blogs over the last few weeks:

• Riding the downwards motion as well as the up in canter - the canter from the other day felt very "down" and that all my weight was in my middle. I'm thinking that maybe, just MAYBE I had it and that I was holding my own weight, wasn't blocking T from going forwards and that as a result we had that lovely floaty canter that went on and on. Maybe.
• Working from the thigh rather than the lower leg. On Strider, I really struggled to get my weight out of my stirrups. Rising trot needs to come from the thigh to stop the knee straightening and pointing downwards. I blogged the other day about when I have no stirrups I seem to be riding off my thigh rather than my lower leg.

I'm by no means saying I've got it but I THINK that I've had a few glimpses of what i need to achieve. Need to think, as Becky says, about what I can do to get those glimpses WITH stirrups as well as without. Will talk lots to instructor tomorrow. I think I may ring her tonight to extend the lesson from half hour to an hour to process it all lol.

By being a (significantly) heavier person, the "little" bits about my position, my weight etc were a whole lot more magnified I think and it's all made me realise just how subtle changes really do have a MASSIVE impact on what the horse is feeling.

I hope I never "yank" my saddle over to the right again after seeing what it did to poor Strider! I really don't think I NEED to do that, just sorting myself out and shifting my own weight will have more than enough of an impact.

But with that in mind, I really do have to stop worrying quite so much about my weight and I need to actually USE it in order to not have it HINDER T. I really hindered Strider in trot because I was flapping so much over keeping my weight off him. I have the dubious honour of having made a mechanical horse LAME in trot *bawls* by being so tense. As soon as Becky gave me a little pep talk about not being too heavy for him, to sit down in the saddle and actually grab my waistband to keep me in place, meant we got a two time beat to the trot.

Although it puts me in fear of over analysing, I couldn't help but think back to when I'm hacking and I frequently think T is lame so push him on and he's not. I've always thought it was just T slopping along and not working properly but now I think it's more to do with me blocking him so much!

My rein contact improved over the weekend too once I figured out what Strider was measuring. It really does make you *think* about just what you're doing wiggling about on top. Whilst we didn't work on that, it was still useful to see those lines jumping all over the place.

My brain is turning to mush now. There is so much more I got out of the weekend and I can't wait to play with T today and test out some stuff.


No doubt there will be some long blog entries to come... sorry!