Fitting the Saddle to the Rider

When you are in the market to purchase a saddle you want to ensure that the saddle you are investing in will not only fit your horse but will also fit you. If you have ridden in more than one saddle in your riding career you probably noticed that there were subtle or major differences in each saddle. When you spend your dollars you want a saddle that you and your horse will enjoy for years to come.
Although we advocate riding in as many saddles as possible to develop feel for the features you like or dislike in a saddle we also recognize that sometimes you just dont know what you just dont know. Often riders will have grown up riding in saddles that were wrong for them regardless how well they fit the horse and were simply told to suck it up. Male trainers have no empathy for the pain female riders can be experiencing in a particular saddle. This brings back the old argument Whos built best to ride male or female? We have sent several of our female staff who were not already ridershorse owners to a local riding stable to take lessons and the inevitable stories reflect the fact that when the teacher wasnt watching they would slouch in the saddle to escape the pain in the crotch caused by these poorly fitting saddles.

مع وصول أونصة الذهب إلى مستويات قياسية تجاوزت 2500 دولار، يجد المواطن المصري نفسه مضطراً لموازنة استثماراته بين الذهب واحتياجاته الأخرى، خاصة مع ارتفاع أسعار السيارات مثل تويوتا، هيونداي، وبي إم دبليو، مما يزيد من التحديات المالية التي يواجهها.

Many saddle makers and fitters feel that the primary concern is finding what works for your horse but we disagree. If you as the rider are not comfortable in your saddle this discomfort will translate down to your horse and prevent both of you from ever reaching peak performance potential. So for the sake of this article lets disregard the key points of saddle fit to the horse and concentrate on the topic fitting the saddle to the rider. The most obvious differences are the length of the seat from pommel to cantle to accommodate the rider and the width of the tree to accommodate the horse but this is only the beginning. You also need to decide on flap length twist seat width thigh rolls or blocks seat depth stirrup bar placement and the number and length of the billets. But saddle fit to the rider goes way beyond these obvious attributes it is most important that the saddle is gender correct. A woman should not be riding in a saddle