07/12/2024
I dedicated December to ba****ck rides only
As I’m out here in the peace and quiet doing walk trot and cantering I started to think about how it all started
I was around 11-12 when I started riding racing standarbreds. I didn’t not own a saddle so most rides were done ba****ck.
I had no formal riding education except for a few years at a young age at the local riding schools where we rode in groups of 15-20 and I didn’t learn squat.
In the Standardbreds I found my calling, and at 14 I got my first saddle. (I still have it although the tree is broken but I have so many memories with it I can’t part with it)
We would ride these racehorses both on relaxing trail rides or train them on the track under saddle. Often we would ride galloping intervals and the horses trainers watched with stop watches.
I definitely found my need for speed there.
And I learned how willing and awesome the Standardbred breed is.
When I started taking formal riding lessons at age 35 on an off the track 3 year old I suddenly found out that I could not ride at all.
Diagonals and leads were words i never knew existed.
I have been fortunate to be able to take lessons and learn from some great trainers and although my bad habit of leaning forward (how we got the racehorses to break into a gallop) still is something I struggle with.
But in hindsight, all the ba****ck rides made me the rider I am today, although I’m not perfect, I can still work on it every day.
In a world where I was told daily I was useless and would never accomplish anything, I proved him wrong.
My self confidence was at zero when I entered my first show with said 3 year old trotter, and we won 2 classes.
At 56 it’s a privilege to have a horse I trust 100% to put up with my antics but after a summer of very limited riding I am challenging myself yet again.
Sorry for the bumpy video but we had a great ride and I wanted to share the fun!
