Beginner riding tips #3: Crookedness in your body and how it affects your riding

We are all crooked in small ways.

For example, I'm right-handed. If you practice yoga, you might notice that it's harder for you to bend in one direction than another.

Normally, these are invisible in our daily lives, but when you ride, all of our flaws come rushing to the fore. Some of the effects are easy to notice immediately; when we first swing onto a horse, our stirrups tend to feel uneven for a few minutes. But what about all the myriad other unevenness in our bodies? How can we correct for our problems if we are unaware of them?

Inspired after reading "Balance in Movement," I have been carefully monitoring my body over the past several weeks and matching it up with problems I experienced in the saddle. I'm fairly confident in the resulting observations, so I wanted to share some tips in hopes that they will help in a small way. 

Hands

This is an easy one. You tend to write/brush your teeth/do everything with one hand. This tends to make your dominant hand the stronger of the two and consequently, you pull on the rein harder with your dominant hand.

Leaning

When standing, people rarely stand with their weight square, i.e. evenly distributed over both feet. We lean on one foot or another. (I tend to lean on my right foot most of the time.) This carries over to the saddle and you tend have more weight on the seat bone that you lean towards.

Legs

This was was hardest for me to notice, despite the help of my instructor. Early on, she noted that my right heel tends to creep up more than my left. I nodded and moved on. What I didn't realize until recently was that my right leg is weaker than my left in general. Giving a leg aid for turning right takes significantly more thought and effort for me than turning left. I corroborated this feeling with physical evidence: the wear marks on my half chaps. There were stronger wear marks on my left half chap than my right.

Final Thoughts

Beyond the three tips mentioned in this post, another great way for riders to notice unevenness would be through a body-introspective activity like yoga or pilates. These exercises also help you build core strength which is key for good riding!

In terms what to do about the crookedness, the book mentioned earlier in the post, Balance in Movement, has great list of exercises. Other than that, just knowing your enemy is half the battle, right?