Apologies for the rather long break in posts….

Let’s just say the winter was incredibly productive, I have plenty of subject matter for discussion, and a resounding welcome back to Blogland!

Three weeks ago, I had the opportunity to ride with Coach Daniel Stewart in his Video Analysis clinic. The gist of the clinic is all riders are videoed in various gaits and positions and then Coach Stewart analyses the results. He highlights position issues, body alignment, and anything physical that we as riders are doing as we ride. He then dissects ‘the good, the bad, and the ugly’ frame by frame, highlights areas that need work, and provides guidance on the ground before getting back in the tack to put changes into practice.

Watching oneself in minute, frame by frame detail, backwards, forwards, over again is awkward to say the least. Yet it’s also quite enlightening. In a few minutes it helped me to see what I cannot always feel, and then link the two together to create positive change in my riding.

The second half of the clinic was ridden again. After the video analysis, I had an inkling of what to work on in the tack. Coach Stewart took it much further and zoomed straight into the crux of the matter.

For me, it was the struggle of muscle memory pulling my upper body forward. And now, it is finding the correct upper body position and reprogramming the muscle memory.

Reprogramming the what?

So, what exactly is muscle memory?

According to Wikipedia:

Muscle memory has been used synonymously with motor learning, which is a form of procedural memory that involves consolidating a specific motor task into memory through repetition. When a movement is repeated over time, a long-term muscle memory is created for that task, eventually allowing it to be performed without conscious effort. This process decreases the need for attention and creates maximum efficiency within the motor and memory systems. Examples of muscle memory are found in many everyday activities that become automatic and improve with practice, such as riding a bicycle, typing on a keyboard, typing in a PIN, playing a melody or phrase on a musical instrument, playing video games,^[1] or performing different algorithms for a Rubik’s Cube.

So what does that have to do with riding? Everything! Do you remember when you first learned to ride how much you had to keep reminding yourself to ‘sit up tall’, ‘keep your heels down’, or ‘thumbs on top of the reins’. Eventually you adopted the muscle memory to do these things naturally and you stopped thinking about it. Your body could remember where to be and you could start focussing on more advanced riding skill.

Muscle memory is a powerful force within you, and unfortunately it doesn’t always take you to the best possible position in riding. Muscle memory does take you to a place that is comfortable, and if you are lucky enough to never have picked up any bad posture habits, or never had a debilitating injury, you may be just fine.

But most of us, me included, have had many physical injuries or accidents (uh, hello dirt surfing!) Our bodies cope well and most likely have expertly adapted the muscle memory needed to keep us comfortable, albeit not necessarily in postural balance.

I’ll be the first to admit that I am plagued with imbalance in my body. A serious back injury years ago left me overcompensating to the right and protective of the injury site. I’ve had to accept that I may never be completely symmetrical, and that I probably never was to start with. In my riding, my muscle memory helps me to hunch over from my shoulders and appear to be in a ‘constant crunch’ as Coach Stewart put it. I didn’t even know I was doing it. I certainly didn’t feel like I was anything other than straight.

Hard to accept, all was not yet lost. The beauty of muscle memory is that it can change. It can be reprogrammed to create a correct riding position, and it can be done in only 3 weeks! However, it is NOT easy and it requires concentration, diligence and constant vigilance to make the change.

The decision to make the change was easy. I am always pursuing to ride to the top of my potential. Making the actual change was tough. No, let’s face it:

Week 1 = agony!

Week 2 = barely tolerable.

Week 3 = my body’s gradual and reluctant acceptance of the change.

Entering Week 4… I think I’ve cracked it.

How did I do it? I just started constantly analysing my shoulders and upper back. If I slumped, I sat back up. When I rode I kept the mantra Coach Stewart gave me in my head every stride: “Lift up, burn back, lift up, belly down”. If I lapsed I corrected. I carried on this way for three weeks; in the tack, in the car, during workouts, at work, at home, everywhere, all the time, no matter how awful it felt. The way I looked at is was that if I installed this new muscle memory in all aspects of my physical existence, it would have a better chance of taking root.

And it did. It’s easy to look back in retrospect and say, ‘Yeah, that wasn’t so hard’. But I’d be lying to myself. I was constantly exhausted and just wanted to quit. A lot of the time my shoulders ached in agony and screamed at me for a break. Half way through Week 2, when I felt like giving up, I thought about how far I’d come and asked how badly I really wanted to change. Turns out I wanted it more than anything and I kept it up. Eventually I got it, and can happily report that so much has changed as a result.

My riding is different, more balanced, more confident. I feel physically stronger. The horses I ride feel softer, more engaged and responsive. Gage, Mr Lazy himself, has become more willing. And I am loving every stride like I never have before.

The moral of this story? If you want something badly enough, you will find the courage and will to persevere. When it’s all over, you will look back and amaze yourself.

A big thank you to Coach Stewart!

Here is a taste of the final ride at the clinic. Hope you enjoy it!

It’s been awhile since I’ve posted. My focus the past month has been very internal and I’ve had the opportunity to delve ever deeper into the spectrum of my strengths, weaknesses and all that comes between me and my equestrian dream. Self-exploration always comes along a bumpy road, and this time it’s been quite literal.

Ahh, the joy of dirt surfing… We all know as horsemen that falls are part of our sport and the occasional fall is usually isolated, unfortunate, a fluke, but overall just a blip on the screen. When that one fall turns into a second a week later, and then a third a few weeks after that, and the chiropractic bill starts getting steep, it is time to sit up and take notice!

That first fall was no biggie. We were cantering down the long side of the ring outside and something in the distance caught Gage’s eye causing him to execute a lovely 90 degree turn throwing me unsuspectingly into the dirt. No harm done, the footing is soft enough and hey, it happens, right? The second fall a week later got my attention. Riding inside in a lesson on a windy, rainy day, I heard the wind pick up and tree branches hit the side of the arena. For a microsecond I focussed on the distraction as we cantered a circle, Gage spooked and I yet again found myself in the dirt. This one hurt more, but I was still roughly in one piece and got back up to finish the lesson. Needless to say, I wasn’t terribly pleased with myself, but at the same time I experienced an instant shift in my riding. I relaxed, despite lingering trepidation and some soreness in my body, I let my focus soften and released the grip of my leg. As a result, the last five minutes of my lesson went smoothly, Gage was willingly forward and I felt like despite the fall I would be alright.

As a precaution I pulled out my body protector and have been donning it ever since. Riding youngsters, it can’t hurt to have that little extra protection. I also started focussing on allowing as a key ingredient to each ride, and things started to improve quickly. The less I tried to muscle Gage around, the more he gave and soon he actually became quite willingly forward. Forward has always been the hardest part with this horse and he has required a lot of energy to keep going. Too much human energy and not enough horse effort is more like it! But as soon as I took my leg off of him and allowed my body to relax, he stepped up the pace. I suddenly had a forward and willing (well, relatively willing, we are still dealing with the highly opinionated Mr Gage!) horse.

I felt like I had cracked it. Things were going well, each ride was getting better. I pulled Sally Swift’s Centered Riding off the shelf and immersed myself in a refresher course. I started looking into methods of sport psychology and learning how to craft the all important head game. Gage got his first pair of front shoes, figured out his back-end really is an engine, and he seemed to blossom into his body overnight. Lessons were productive and all seemed well in horsey-land.

I wouldn’t say I’d become completely complacent, however, I did truly believe I’d learned the necessary lessons from the falls and that all was again moving in the right direction. That’s a dangerous place to be, thinking (or maybe hoping) the worst is over and gingerly stepping out on the path again. I can see now in hindsight that the third fall was inevitable, but at the time it felt implausible because I really thought I’d made headway.

The third fall came again with a spook, this time cantering past the open door of the arena. Something caught Gage’s eye and he made another one of those abrupt 90 degree turns. I really thought I had it, I stayed up and managed to go with the movement until the final moment when I grabbed his neck and thought it was over. Gage stopped abruptly and suddenly dropped his head. Gravity did the rest and before I knew it I had gone from thinking I’d dodged the bullet to sliding down his neck and face planting in the footing. I quite literally ate dirt. My nose took the brunt of the impact and I was certain I’d broken it, but no blood, no swelling, no real harm done.

With a few choice “#@& #!*&!”  (feel free to fill in the explicative of your choice) I got up spitting out dirt with my pride. There was a new feel to this fall, something I’ve never experienced before.  A wall of anger hit me and I had to walk away from Gage to distance myself from everything.  I was so angry because I thought I was done. I thought I’d figured things out and I thought I had overcome the hurdle. How wrong I had been!

I let the anger work through me as I continued to spit and clean my face off. Abrupt reactions of rage softened to methodically rearranging my helmet and dusting off my breeches. Tears of release started to flow and when I finally felt calm, I walked back over to Gage. He, bless his soul, stood in one spot the entire time waiting for my return. I scratched him on the forehead, gathered up the reins and started leading him back to the mounting block. We cantered both leads for good measure and called it a day. Gage seemed completely nonplussed by the event, and I felt I’d been through the wringer.

I’ve heard it said that one needs to hit rock bottom before being truly able to change. This may have been my riding rock bottom. Reacting in anger was a new experience for me, and one that I don’t want to culture as the norm. Instead, I see the anger as the catalyst that has helped me to go deeper to pinpoint the issue. I’ve done a lot of soul searching, even toyed with the notion of ‘How badly do I really want this dream?’ and the consequences of giving up. The word ‘can’t’ isn’t really in my vocabulary, yet I had to face the reality that I might not be able to pursue the dream.

Giving up scares me more than falling, so I started to craft a plan. I spent much of October delving deep within to find my truth. What did I really want to achieve as a horseman? Was it worth the inherent risks of riding? Why was I having all the falls in the first place? And what was I going to do about it?

Here is what I learned: In my constant pursuit of winning the head game, I’ve become too wrapped up in my head. I have become reliant on techniques to distract from the ‘what if’ scenario, as a result riding from my head and not from my body. It’s almost like a complete disconnect had happened where my body could sit in the tack robotically, while my mind did the ride. Despite Gage’s seemingly thick skinned demeanour, he is really a very sensitive horse and the bond we have created over the past four years is strong. He reads me better than I read myself, and if the thought of ‘that might be spooky, I better focus elsewhere’ crosses my mind, he picks up on it and reacts accordingly. I can’t fault him at all, he is just doing what I am telling him to do.

And so the humbling realisation is: I caused each and everyone of the falls. I built the mental picture of fear, even if for a nanosecond, and true to form, Gage followed suit. I’ve realised the only way to stop the spooks and potential spills that follow, is to make a change inside myself. I must transition from being in constant head space, to getting back into my body when I ride. Call it feel, connection, or what have you, it doesn’t matter. What does matter is the shift needs to come within before it takes effect.

So how am I doing this? On the ground its doing more yoga, breathing exercises, working on a balance board and taking long hikes in the woods to recalibrate. On horse, I’ve decided to go back to complete basics and have started riding bareback. I’ve never been a big fan of riding without tack, but I’m going to have to get past that and start to get really comfortable with it. The good thing is Gage has filled out quite a lot and he is very comfortable to ride now. The first time I rode him bareback a year ago, it felt like straddling the edge of a very steep cliff. Now he has a broad back and his muscles are soft and supple. The change has been amazing. I feel connected to Gage like never before and I am beginning to trust my body without the incessant instruction from my mind. That alone is worth its weight in gold. I’m looking forward to bareback lunge line lessons and getting really balanced and connected. The ultimate benchmark will be jumping bareback. When I’m doing that well, then I know I will have made the shift.

It’s going to be a long winter of hard work, but I’m up for it. I love a challenge, all the better that it involves my life’s passion and the partnership I have with Mr. Gage.

If you’ve made it this far, thanks for sticking in to the end! As always, a post wouldn’t be complete without a visual, so here is a fun little video of Gage kicking up his heels a few weeks ago free schooling in the arena. He’s looking good and getting closer to being a grown-up every day. Enjoy it!

Best,

Gage and Annalise