I have actually seen jackets like this…
GET. OUT. That’s the greatest. I felt like such a weirdo for even thinking of doing it.
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Agreed. In the two good lesson programs in my area, each horse has his or her own saddle. In the best interest of the program to keep the horses comfortable.
Yikes?!?! Really??
And that is way it is at the dressage barn I ride at and the university lesson program we used to have. Each horse has their own fitted tack. I was kind of surprised at the other barn where it was “fit the rider”. I cannot imagine how a lesson program does it. Having a custom saddle for each horse isn’t tenable. Horses change out frequently in many programs.
Of course not. Every other lesson program I’ve been connected with has tack fitted to the horse (mostly second hand) and a saddle fitter that comes at some interval. I was surprised that we were asked to fit us and that all the saddles got all the lesson horses well.
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2dogs picks up jaw… With both hands…
Well, in the mid-later 80s, when I came back to showing, we did call the Low Hunters division the Pro Hunters & the 2nd Year Green was unofficially for trainers riding clients’ horses only.
But IIRC, both were 2’6-2’9 divisions.
Me & my equally rebellious trainer/friend had me show my horse in both.
And we usually placed high, even won some Champions & Reserves.
This despite doing Meh in the U/S classes.
Once, after a 2nd Year Green where I placed 2nd, other Pros rushed over to ask him why he “let” me ride the horse.
His reply (for which I love him to this day):
“Because it’s her horse.” 
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Maybe it’s the Cha-Ching! of charging the parents for a Pro Ride? 
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All the classes in a given (hunter or jumper) division running together, instead of spread out evenly through the day.
And back to back rides in hunters, with the judge keeping two cards at the same time
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Surprises for me??? The short riding coats. Short, and baggy (in my opinion). I guess, if you are 16 years old, and enjoy havin’ people lookin’ at yur bum, well… have at it. But really, the flowing line of a correctly fitted riding coat just touches the cantle of the saddle when you are sitting down IMO, a flattering line. It covers the bum of the rider, just to some extent, as we go over the jump. I find the current “short” riding coats, that seem to end practically above the belt loops on the britches unflattering. And no flattering lines on the body of the rider… kinda baggy.
I didn’t show much for quite a while, and went I did, it was the jumper division, other than some hunters at schooling shows with greenies, horses which I usually sold on before they got to a real show. Not much time for showing while training racehorses etc. But then we moved away from all that, and I came back to going to some horse shows in my old age, and (yikes) I guess about 10 years ago now, I needed a riding coat, since my last riding coat no longer fit me (the one from 30 years ago). So I went riding coat shopping. Yikes, very scary. Then I found one, on the “sales” rack. It was crap, not a “make” that I recognized, made in India I think. Some sort of polyester type stuff, not “stretchy”, not short. And BROWN…dark brown… such an unfashionable colour (apparently). Now, I’ve had brown riding coats before in my life, and I really don’t care about making fashion statements. And dammmm… it fit me perfect. And cost $50. So I bought the dam thing. It’s great, I throw it in the washing machine when I need to, easy care. It’s still functional. And though in recent years, again I have ridden mostly in the little jumper divisions (so it doesn’t matter), I use that dark brown coat. I like it, it fits me, and it covers my arse to the extent that I feel it looks best. And if someone else doesn’t like it, I’ll see you in the jump off. And yes, now that my current mount actually IS a hunter not a jumper… yes, when I get to a horse show again, it will be that brown unfashionable coat that I will be wearing (if it still fits me, haven’t tried it on since Covid). Don’t worry, I don’t go to any of those fancy A circuit shows in the USA, but yes, I’d use it to any show I plan to attend in my area. Perhaps I’ll be a “trend setter”, and things will change yet again.
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Or, the agony of trying to take off a custom Dehner dress boot after you’ve sprained your ankle because there is no way your mom is going to buy you a new pair of boots if they cut yours off! <— ask me how I know this.
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In hunterland, my personal thought is that the jumps have gotten more and more ‘scary’, we have more re-riders/ammys, and children’s classes rarely cater to bigger jumps.
Some of the jumps in the Hunter ring are so full of brush, boxes, etc that I can’t identify if there’s even poles in there. Even in the low low classes. I’m not surprised that people need their trainer to muscle the horse over the course the first time; nobody wants to fall off. The amount of fill in the jumps seems to vary by region. Some places have an average or even less than average amount, and others look like they stole a whole Christmas wreath isle and bedecked the jumps out. Like a whole Michael’s floral craft section got used. ‘Greenery’ or not, when you have a mountain of fake plants in a desert of sand, that looks weird to the horses.
Secondly, we have more ammy riders and adult riders who don’t want to jump the big stuff. They get out to the barn 2x a week, they have kids at home, and they can’t really put in the effort it takes to be jumping big courses.
Last point: we don’t really teach kids to jump over 2’9. It’s not uncommon to keep kids on ponies until way, way late. Then we switch them to junior hunters, but those classes usually don’t go above 2’6-2’9 for juniors. So then these kids go off, maybe leave horses for a while during college/early career, and finally come back later. And they didn’t jump over 3ft when they were young and fearless; now they sure as heck don’t want to jump it now!
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Huh? Junior hunters are either 3’3" or 3’6". Large ponies jump 3’, as do children’s hunters.
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I’m sorry, I should have said that clearer. At the bigger shows, yes. But the majority of the population is showing unrated or smaller rated shows.
The ‘pipeline’ with hunters for riders with the $$ to show at the bigger shows still works fine. Look at how the top junior eq riders go onto 1.60 careers. But most people don’t have that money. The lesson barn isn’t signing up their riders for the bigger stuff.
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Those aren’t junior hunters though, that’s my point.
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Yes, as I said, I should have worded it more clearly.
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A few great things:
-washable tech fabrics for shirts and jackets AND better tech fabrics. OH MY GOD this is the most magical thing. I love being able to do all my laundry at home.
-better fabrics and better colors of breeches. I’m having a ball in my teal and berry colored breeches in summer with sticky knee patches. And a variety of rises! The mid rise is my new favorite.
-better fitting saddles. I know some folks have griped on here about custom saddles, but quite honestly, I never had a saddle really fit me until I came back after a 10+ year hiatus. It’s glorious, my knee no longer goes over the flap and it fits my horse. I also like not having to “break it in” as hard as I did my full grain leather ones.
-burgundy coats in the hunters. I’m having fun with mine. Would never have dreamed of wearing it when I was a junior!
-online consignment shopping. I buy practically everything used. It is my way of life. Bless FB Marketplace and all the FB buy/sell groups.
-footing advancements for at home and at shows. I’m really glad to see more places putting such an emphasis on good, safe footing because that was not always the case 10+ years ago.
-boots with zippers. I have never been so obsessed as I am now with my LM boots with zippers.
A few crummy things:
-fewer opportunities to just bum around with horses. Part of this is adult life, part of this is simply the shrinking properties available for horses and horse activities.
-the duck is up with all these white shirts? I miss my colored shirts!
-good tack and gear is more expensive than ever before. For me to get the right fit, I’m spending way more than I ever have–hence why I’ve turned to consignment. I’m also shocked at the quality of some things (like eskadrons) that years ago seemed so reliable and now just fall apart after a year. I’m used to getting 5+ years use out of things
-six figure 2’6’’ horses. To be clear: I do not begrudge those folks one iota who prefer to stick to the under 3’ divisions. It means their horses will keep on trucking a long time. But it’s driven up the cost of a kind of horse 10+ years ago would have been under the 30k mark easy. It’s a total head scratcher
-costs of leases are a lot higher. Now I see 50% of price vs 25-30% back then. Makes way more sense to purchase than lease for those on a budget IMO (which is what I did).
-a lot more “prep” for horses to show. I’m a little distressed by this. I’m grateful my guy only does a class on Thursday and Wednesday–maybe two if he gets uppity about something–before we do one division on the weekend. But I see a lot of other horses routinely lunging daily or hacking 40+ minutes and then jumping 2 divisions during the week with the pro, and then doing an additional 2 divisions on the weekend. Usually over the course of at least 2-3 weeks. It just seems like a lot. Maybe they have a lot of downtime in between. It’s different from how I grew up–some days you just dealt with a fresh horse. That said, I am grateful my trainer makes every effort to make sure my guy gets his (very rare) antics out earlier so that we have an enjoyable time on the weekend without incident. It was one thing to be a junior and get bucked off. It’s harder 15+ years later to pick myself up when the horse decides that sign on the rail is just plain awful and wants nowhere within 10 feet of it.
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It’s like the ol’ Ford Model T. “Any customer can have the car painted any color they like - so long as it’s black!”
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The thing that always surprises me is that poorly fitting shaped saddle pads are still common in hunter classes. Especially with all options we have for saddle pads anymore.
You see a kid riding a six figure childrens hunter with a custom saddle and thousands of dollars worth of show clothes she will outgrow in a year, yet still has an ugly, bunched up fleece saddle pad detracting from the image.
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These days a judge is lucky if it’s only two cards.
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LOL! But have to say that after my 17 year hiatus it now looks big to me! I can’t believe I used to jump higher.
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