Butt Clap

[phoenixrises]

How’s that for a title to a thread?! Alas, it’s embarrassing yet true. Every time I canter my mare and sit down in my dressage saddle, my butt cheeks “clap” and it sound like a loud fart, all the way around the arena. Stop laughing, it’s embarrassing!! I’ve never had this issue before, mare has a lot of suspension in the canter but is still a bit down hill and learning to balance better. I’m slightly out of shape. Here’s my guess, I"m tenser than I think I am and it pushes me out of the saddle more, add the 30lbs I’ve put on this year (yeah working form home) and you get butt jiggle/clap. Ridden other horses in same saddle no sound, so it’s something unique to her and me. I’ve tried to think of relaxing, or tensing or following more and the only thing that stops it is not sitting.

Please tell me what I can do with my body to help this!!

[SmartAlex]

I get butt clap in two point with certain stirrup lengths. With each stride the seat comes up and smacks my butt. So I feel your pain. It was mentioned here in another thread in the past year, so we are not alone.

pfutt…pfutt…pfutt…pfutt…pfutt…pfutt…

[jaybird660]

I’m sorry but I did laugh out loud! If the “clap” is a result of you being out of balance due to the saddle fit on the horse or for you, that would be one place to investigate.
SmartAlex, I call that butt feedback. I don’t feel you should get slapped in the behind on every stride. That would lead me to believe there is a pivot that shouldn’t be happening.

[Winding_Down]

The Butt clap is difficult to cure and i hear it is contagious.

Do you use protection? I hear it is 95% effective unless you break through it.

Check your breeches, saddle soap, and all that. Maybe your breeches or your saddle are too sticky.

I assume you do not want many people to know that you got the butt clap… ssshhhhh…

[phoenixrises]

[QUOTE=jaybird660;8159975]
I’m sorry but I did laugh out loud! If the “clap” is a result of you being out of balance due to the saddle fit on the horse or for you, that would be one place to investigate.
SmartAlex, I call that butt feedback. I don’t feel you should get slapped in the behind on every stride. That would lead me to believe there is a pivot that shouldn’t be happening.[/QUOTE]

I spent the better part of yesterday reading a LOT about saddle fit (working no I mean I was working). I was so happy when I found this saddle to fit my impossible horse but on closer inspection it really doesn’t. Luckily what it’s doing is more an issue for me and doesn’t cause her pain. basically it’s cantle high tilting me forward, which somewhere in there is causing this issue. URGH! I’m in the middle of getting all my things together to send you pics/drawings Jay and I may just have to finance a saddle at this point.

[phoenixrises]

[QUOTE=Winding Down;8160135]
The Butt clap is difficult to cure and i hear it is contagious.

Do you use protection? I hear it is 95% effective unless you break through it.

Check your breeches, saddle soap, and all that. Maybe your breeches or your saddle are too sticky.

I assume you do not want many people to know that you got the butt clap… ssshhhhh…[/QUOTE]

At this point I think anyone in the arena with me knows. And I"m at a very busy pony club barn. . . I’m seriously going to get a full body girdle and see if it hold the jiggly bits in as a cure until I can maybe just maybe find a saddle that fits us both.

[Huntin_Pony]

Sheepskin seat cover?

[GutsNGlory]

Ah, the butt clap…

I am a recovering butt clapper with one of my horses. My gelding is built very uphill and he has always been naturally balanced at the canter. So when I started riding his sister last fall, I was in for a butt clapping surprise! She is built a little more downhill (not in the QH sense, but more the TB/WB sense) and has a huge engine and push from behind. The first clinic I took her to, a close friend of mine who was in our group came up and said, “I bet you go to the chiropractor often with that canter!” :lol: I spent the first few months riding her mostly in a half seat or two point and learned that posting in the canter helped balance her to fences. After a winter of dressage work, though, I am proud to say that she is now cantering more uphill and the butt clap has almost entirely disappeared! It was just a matter of teaching her how to correctly use that push from behind and come up underneath herself and forward (and also working on my own core strength). Now, I’d have to say her canter is pretty fabulous!

[ladymcts]

Ceftriaxone.

(head smack probably shouldn’t have looked that up on a work computer …)