[QUOTE=Equibrit;3420793]
Saddle fitting (both horse and rider)is 50% of the problem. If the saddle is not balanced you’re fighting an uphill battle![/QUOTE]
Amen!! Amen!!! Albion, while a good saddle seems to be blessed with some poor saddle fitters.
it comes down to balance!
your leg will comeback when you sit balanced ;):yes:in the saddle; your your hip will open,thigh relax/release and lengthen:yes:; best to have someone help you’Centered riding or Alexander technique
I have to disagree about going out and buying a new saddle…
I’ve never had a lot of money, and have had to make do with the school horse’s saddles, whatever saddle came with the horse, hand-me-downs, etc…
You CAN develop a good seat as long as the saddle is a relatively ok size for you (and I’m assuming your trainer would be able to tell if the saddle was much too small for you or other such glaring problem.)
A chair seat is usually the result of weak thigh and core (abdominal) muscles and/or sitting incorrectly on the seatbones. The age-old fixes apply: lunge lessons, exercises to develop the ‘independent seat’, riding without stirrups, developing inner thigh and core muscles with exercise off the horse.
A lot of riders try to achieve the ‘dressage seat’ by letting down their stirrups too long, and tucking their pelvis under too much… the leg tends to turn outward and the pelvis tucks under and the lower back rounds, the abdominals are collapsed… the rider ends up sitting not squarely on the seatbones but farther back on their butt and the leg just slides forward, and there you have your chair seat. If you rode hunt seat before, try to remember how nice it felt to have your heels down, your back slightly arched and your knee and inner leg securely against the horse.
Ok, I use to catch ride lots of horses with lots of different saddles, even jumper ones… none of their owners did buy or adjust their saddles for me and I don’t remember any of them putting me in to a chair seat… please, don’t spend your money if you don’t have them, just ride with out stirrups and in 6 months you’ll get your good alignment. Look down and make your thigh go straight down from your hip to your knee - don’t worry so much about ankles…
whitehorse is right in that a chair seat doesn’t always mean a bad saddle fit. there are a lot of people with chair seats whose saddle is fine - so it could be that all you need to do is condition yourself, ride, exercise, etc.
core/thigh?
Hi,
Every rider has a different set of issues, but I’m not so sure that a weak core/thighs are always the culprit. As someone who battles chair seat tendencies, I regularly lift weights and as measured by pounds lifted and crunches completed, I have strong abdominal core and leg muscles, but I have trouble keeping my leg underneath me. In my case I struggle with gripping/stiffness more than muscle weakness per se. Stretching has helped.
Richard Weis has a wonderful article that has helped me a great deal: The posture does the riding at http://www.richardweis.com/PostureDTRiding.pdf
[QUOTE=staceyk;3432831]
Richard Weis has a wonderful article that has helped me a great deal: The posture does the riding at http://www.richardweis.com/PostureDTRiding.pdf[/QUOTE]
This is a very good article, when you read the part on" How to be a ‘Good Load to Carry’ for the Horse" you will better understand my recommendation for double posting. Sitting trot or work without stirrups are NOT good exercises for correcting a chair seat in that they can encourage a rider to substitute “gripping” or “locking” for balance.
The “double posting” exercise encourages better balance to become “second nature” very quickly, allowing the rider to move on to learning more refined control and makes synchronizing his movements to his horse in both the trot and canter require less active thought and muscle.
Balance is the basis for any rider’s foundation., dressage or otherwise, and the “chair seat” is simply a deviation from true balance.
sitting vs standing
Weis describes the state of sitting trot as not quite sitting, not quite standing, and he says the weight of your body is distributed from seat to stirrup. An earlier poster talked about sitting bowlegged to stop gripping, which also allows your weight to drop freely. I like to think about hugging/lifting the horse with my ankles, but my legs are long and can curve around the the barrel.
I agree that sitting trot w/o stirrups is not the answer, but I do find that riding a few minutes w/o stirrups helps your leg drop and relax so that it is easier to sit w/stirrups. The sit/post exercise is very helpful, because as you sit you must still stand over your stirrups.
I start alternating sit/post, and then when my position feels right, I think to myself, ‘now do posting trot but skip the rising phase.’ I can often get a good sitting trot by easing into it this way.
Finally, a lot of articles talk about lateral movement in addition to up and down. When I accentuate this at sitting trot it relaxes my hips and improves my seat.
Finally, Practical horseman did a two part series called “Sit that trot” or something like that. It was very helpful to me in understanding the role of the hip flexors.
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