Learning From Media

Alternate title: We Do Actually Have 100 Problems

Back in April, Jen from Cob Jockey did another of her amazing posts about biomechanics . I almost always learn something from these posts and often really think about this stuff at my next ride. This time I read through it and basically thought, "we've got 99 problems but this isn't one" (pinching with my thighs).

Fast forward to a couple of days ago when I got media from the second show.

The first show media makes me happy. It clearly shows some rough moments and tension but overall there's some harmony between me and Katai and while she's a bit hollow mostly she's pretty good for a scary show environment.

Case in point

 However, when I got the media from the second show I was really disappointed. Partially I think that the photographer (a boarder from my previous barn) just happened to catch more of the rough moments than the good moments but between the few rough pictures from the first show and most of the photos from the second show I noticed something in my position that still isn't good. I don't see this as much at home (probably because we're less tense) but I still see it so it's clearly a pattern. It was also something that I couldn't identify just from a picture beyond being unhappy with how it looked haha.

An uncomfortable picture to share but there it is plus...

An example of a similar thing from the first show
At least here she looks pretty good

So, when I went to the barn on Friday evening I started messing around with position stuff. Jane had already started working on the pony and my position at the canter but I wanted to figure out what was going on at the trot. I've thought that it's coming from my hip flexors and core but as I messed around I just happened to do something that changed everything and that was to stop gripping with my thighs!!

There it was, this whole time and it's such a habit that I've been COMPLETELY unaware of it. I would imagine that probably 60-80% of my rides I'm carrying some amount of tension in my thighs which means that I post like Barbie haha. I have to rotate back from that point which leads to my legs coming forward and my seat going to the back of the saddle and my shoulders coming forward to balance and compensate. Plus, then as you can see above my hands to weird things so that I can still post. I'm not pulling per say but I am certainly unable to allow her to come forward in that moment.

As soon as I released that tension I was able to sit down around my pony and be more effective in practically every way. Katai didn't even know what was going on since it's a huge change but I'm really curious to see how it effects her as I get more consistent since there were brilliant moments where I felt her back come up more than is typical for her. My legs were so sore afterwards from using different muscles that this is clearly a big, important change for me to make and one that I'm excited to show Jane.

I'll end the post with my favorite picture from the rated show :)

BOGO: Lesson Recaps 8/6 and 8/14

Checking to see if flower filler is actually edible

In all the excitement of the Hunter Pace last weekend I completely forgot to do a lesson recap from my lesson on Saturday and that's too bad because it was great!

Last Saturday I had a sleepy, low energy pony. Between just not wanting to push her when she was in a good mood and behaving and knowing that she was going to need to expend a lot of energy the next day we took it easy and mainly focused on me. I had let L know what Jane had worked on with me so we focused on helping me keep my back straighter and on how I used my upper body.

Katai was extremely good and was letting me focus on myself and just bopping around despite me flopping around on her like a sack of potatoes and going through all sorts of weird contortions with my body.

About half way through the lesson L called me over and we started identifying what parts of my body need to go where. My lesson with Jane was extremely helpful because she wouldn't let me put my body wrong even once, L usually doesn't call me on things that consistently BUT, Jane didn't break things down in that lesson and focus on muscles and that was what L did on my lesson. She identified the muscle I needed to use as the muscle right above the Kegel muscle (haha)  when all along I've been tightening muscles too far up in my abdomen.

Seriously lacking media but this is my little car at the barn

She walked me through how tightening those muscles meant that I could still breath (pretty important in doing anything well it turns out) while still using my pelvis correctly and when I got it right it felt amazing! I was actually able to control my body when posting while holding myself in the correct position and once I got it Katai clearly relaxed and was more comfortable through her back.

The whole rest of my lesson L was yelling something along the lines of don't forget to use your Kegel muscles! haha

Then today I was able to pretty much continue where we left off before. We pushed Katai a little more but we also worked more on my position through my arms and elbows and focused on my position at the canter. Between the two of us we identified just how much I've been relying on the wrong parts of my body to center myself in the saddle and as soon as we moved one thing a bunch of other pieces fell apart. Right at the end of the lesson I had about 2 seconds of really correct canter position that was the best I've had.

Now I just have to practice this week as well as I did last week so that I can continue to make progress. I feel like for so long I was so much more advanced than Katai that I was always teaching her things and now I feel like she's further along than I am. The exciting thing is that now our progress feels like it's more reliant on me making changes and that's really empowering!