# Embrace the Weight!



## Golden Horse (Feb 20, 2010)

I had a lesson yesterday from a very small, very skinny, 73 year old instructor with the reputation of ‘saying it like it is’

It was a difficult lesson, outside, scary deer went past, gravel being tipped on the road outside, me feeling rough still after my illness.....but still learned some useful things...including do not ride without gloves, when you are using trainers bridle that has nylon reins!


BUT, this kind of shocked me...she sees benefit in my weight, IF I use it properly, Fergie can definitely feel my weight, so if I go into default curl up mode, it dumps on her front end, and I bury her, keep it central and all is good. Then we got to trying leg yield with just using weight, not bad. 

So remember, there are those who wished they carried a little more weight!


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## Horsef (May 1, 2014)

I saw it with my own eyes. A particularly rank horse would toss me easily but the guy almost twice my weight stayed put, without any fancy moves to shut it down. He was just sitting there. The horse tried it once more with him and gave up


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## trailhorserider (Oct 13, 2009)

A little off-topic, but what breed is Fergie? I've been meaning to ask for a while now. :smile:


I'm a little bit (okay a lot) heavier rider too. The biggest disadvantage I have on a regular basis is mounting......I always try to use a block or a log or a depression in the ground. I'm not sure if I can even mount from the ground anymore. When I was younger I was the same weight and mounted from the ground, but now a bit older and with problems like a bone spur in my heel, I am not a graceful mounter anymore. My horses are saints for letting me park them in all sorts of places to get on easier. :faceshot:


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## tinyliny (Oct 31, 2009)

I can't mount from the ground, either. Even a mounting block must be a three step. I can manage, when needed from a fallen log or other, but it's messy and undoubtedly hard on the horse's spine. Once up, I do remarkably well, carrying maybe 50 lbs more than my riding buddies. I am just 'one of the girls'.


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## Kalraii (Jul 28, 2015)

Oh yeah.... I agree. I have to say my 50kg(112lbs) friend is lucky Katie is so well behaved because that horse could literally ride through her every aide into outer space LOL.

I am around 67kg(148lbs) currently give or take a few pounds but a decade ago I was 114kg (252lbs) and before that quarter-life-crisis I was 57kg (126lb). So I've ridden skinny, I've ridden overweight and in-between at some point or other in my life and I wonder what direction the next hurdle will send me on the see-saw of life.... 

More weight means we have to work and ride EXTA better-than-usual to get the same response and then I found the response was more exaggerated, too, which was cool. There was no confusion - go is go, left is left, slow is slow, no BUCKING MEANS _*NO BUCKING*_! When I was at my heaviest I think I was around 95kg (210lbs) but I was amazed to be told I had a much lighter seat than the instructor was expecting in my assessment. I was both proud and mortified at the same time and I can recall with precision the 3rd degree burn travelling up my neck and face. I could also see the registered embarrassment on the other lesson clients and their audience too... >.<

These days I don't think I'd give a hoot.


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## newtrailriders (Apr 2, 2017)

Mounting from the ground is overrated 😊. Thank God for picnic tables, logs, hills, electric boxes, cinder blocks....


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## Golden Horse (Feb 20, 2010)

trailhorserider said:


> A little off-topic, but what breed is Fergie? I've been meaning to ask for a while now. :smile:
> :


She is by a Morgan, out of a QH/Belgian cross, and you can see parts of all of them...Morgan is probably dominant.

I


trailhorserider said:


> I'm a little bit (okay a lot) heavier rider too. The biggest disadvantage I have on a regular basis is mounting......I always try to use a block or a log or a depression in the ground. I'm not sure if I can even mount from the ground anymore. When I was younger I was the same weight and mounted from the ground, but now a bit older and with problems like a bone spur in my heel, I am not a graceful mounter anymore. My horses are saints for letting me park them in all sorts of places to get on easier. :faceshot:


Mounting from the ground, great if you can, or need to in a pinch, far better for horse, rider and tack to use a mounting block. Being big, old and with a shot knee, mounting is ever graceful here either...


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## farmpony84 (Apr 21, 2008)

I "used to could" mount bareback from the ground. I was cool like that... Now... I almost never mount from the ground. Mounting blocks are magical things...


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## Loner (Dec 21, 2017)

I am 68 and 150 lbs. and I mount from ground.BUT its not a pretty sight.Its like in slow motion from the ground till my back side meets the saddle.


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## tinyliny (Oct 31, 2009)

I read somewhere that it's easier for men than fir women, to have the leg tightly bent against your side and still be able to stand quite close to the horse for the "pull up" motion. This is due to the way women's hips are shaped and the leg bone going more sideways when it it raised and folded as in reaching up for the stirrup. 
I simply CANNOT lift my leg, bent, high enough to catch the stirrup.


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## Celeste (Jul 3, 2011)

I can catch my stirrup fine from the ground. I then pull, and struggle, and heave, and curse, and I still can't get up. Dang it.

Mounting from the ground is harder on the horse's back, harder on your saddle, and highly over rated anyway.


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## Golden Horse (Feb 20, 2010)

Celeste said:


> Mounting from the ground is harder on the horse's back, harder on your saddle, and highly over rated anyway
> 
> 
> .



You got that right!


I actually am learning to work with my weight now....seeing as i’m unlikely to wake up 50 pounds lighter in the morning, may as well use it properly...it is a different feeling, not being ashamed, but empowered to use it for an advantage.


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## AnitaAnne (Oct 31, 2010)

Celeste said:


> I can catch my stirrup fine from the ground. I then pull, and struggle, and heave, and curse, and I still can't get up. Dang it.
> 
> Mounting from the ground is harder on the horse's back, harder on your saddle, and highly over rated anyway.


This is such a good description of my mounting technique...

:dance-smiley05::dance-smiley05::dance-smiley05:

:rofl::rofl::rofl:


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## AnitaAnne (Oct 31, 2010)

@Golden Horse This whole weight being an advantage is such good news! Just in time too as I was starting a diet this week


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## JoBlueQuarter (Jan 20, 2017)

Lol, @AnitaAnne. I've been on a diet for a while... those are over-rated too! :rofl:

I haven't ridden in a while, but after filling the water tank today I wanted to show it to Blue. So I haltered her and, on a spur-of-the-moment urge, and got on even though I didn't have a lead rope. Blue seemed a little confused at first, but with my newly gained weight (ahem), I was able to steer her all the way across the pasture, through a gate and to the water in the far corner without a hitch.  I like to think that she actually listened to my cues instead of just realizing that there was water and wanted to get to it. :lol:


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