Several months ago, I noticed that my tailbone was really starting to hurt, not while riding but afterwards and continuing for a couple days after my ride. I am a re-rider who took about seven years off and just started again last August. I never had this problem before. Though I started riding again in August, I started noticing this pain and soreness probably in early March. At that time, I was riding in an older, too-small-for-me saddle and was already thinking about buying a new saddle that fit me and the horse better. I thought that might help. I bought a new saddle and the tailbone-area pain persisted.
Since then, I’ve come to the conclusion that it isn’t my actual tailbone itself that hurts, but it seems to be the muscles/tendons/ligaments around it. I’ve noticed pain after horseback riding, but it tends to feel a bit worse after sessions with my personal trainer. During those, I am not doing anything involving sitting on my tailbone, but I do plenty of exercises that work those muscles around it. The pain comes and goes. If I haven’t ridden or exercised in a few days, I don’t feel any pain at all. My trainer knows that I ride but he’s not an equestrian himself, so he has some educated guesses on what the problem could be but isn’t completely sure.
I was working out by myself last night and noticed a particular exercise that I used to always do gave me some discomfort. Most exercises don’t actually give me any grief during them, but I notice the pain afterwards, almost like a muscle soreness. This exercise involved a side plank and then lifting and moving my top leg to the front and then moving it in an arc to the back, and then back to front. I am not sure if that makes sense. I tried to find an example online but didn’t have much luck.
When I told my trainer, he seemed to think that it made sense that if my tailbone area is sensitive/hurting, that exercise might cause some trouble. However, he seems to think that horseback riding is what’s causing this issue. I’ve been working with this trainer for several years and have been doing a lot of the same exercises, including this one, for years. Never before have I had these issues until March of this year. His reasoning is the timing of the problem but also his understanding of squeezing with my legs and how that might affect the muscles near my tailbone.
This might be unrelated but could be related, so I’m mentioning it–I’ve noticed that my lower back gets really, really tight while I’m riding. I might be over-arching my lower back or letting my lower back get way too tight.
FWIW - I ride in a close contact saddle. I don’t jump anymore, only flat. Since I started riding again, I’ve fallen off once (knock on wood). It was last August and I did not land on my tailbone.
Has anyone else had these issues or have any insight to share?
