Too Much 2-Point Gets Me Exhausted

In the two previous weeks I had done 5 minutes of two-point for five minutes (with rests) when I started my rides, on both Cider and MJ. The results were GOOD, but I ended up just too exhausted. That puts me in a quandary, if I want a better ride I have to start off in 2-point from the first step, but after 4 sessions of this in a week and a half I was EXHAUSTED, bone deep exhaustion that did not let up all week. I did not have enough energy to do my housework chores, I did not have enough energy to write my blog, I just dissolved into a puddle of inert protoplasm.

After my homework ride Friday a week ago I was bushed. On Saturday I called Shannon to cancel my Sunday ride since I was still tired bone deep (the centers of my humerus and femur bones felt exhausted too!). It all worked out, Cider had sort of wrenched a pastern joint running around in the grazing paddock so we both got the day off when we needed it.

By Wednesday, in time for my lesson, I felt just my normal background level of tiredness, so I was good to go! Of course I started MJ off by staying up in two-point (stopping to rest twice) for the full five minutes. When I sat down at the end of it I got the impression from MJ that he would have preferred me to stay up in two-point the whole ride. Sorry MJ, I just cannot do that anymore.

However there were times, when I felt like his back was having some problems, when I managed to do a minute or so more in two-point, just enough so his back felt better to me.

During my exhaustion I had been thinking about what I had read in Sylvia Loch's books about weighting the inside stirrup. I had tried to do so, but I just could not come up with a way to let gravity move my weight down into the stirrup. Then I remembered the picture of important riding muscles in “Horse Brain, Human Brain” by Janet L. Jones, PhD on page 121. I had not been concentrating much at all on the third muscle she points out as important to riding, the quadratus lumborom which inserts at the top of the pelvis bone. I realized that if I relaxed that muscle then the weight of my leg would be free to slide down into the stirrup.

I tried this on MJ. It worked quite well, he did a nice gradual curve with almost no hand aids and minimal lower leg aids. The weight of my inside leg went down into the stirrup easily AND my weight also sank down to my inside seat bone. Before I had not been able to do both things at once, this time it worked by just relaxing that one muscle. Debbie told me she could not see my aids at all—yeah, invisible aids! MJ reacted well to this aid unlike the other seat aids for turning I had been trying, he did a normal curve without immediately tending to go into a turn in place. This is going to work!

I trotted MJ several times. By the third time his back felt softer. The final trot I decided to gingerly try to sit the trot some, starting with my seat barely grazing the saddle while I kept my seat bones following the movements of the big muscles of his back. Then I tried a little more weight in the saddle, still in a “crotch seat” and he accepted that. He was not too sure about what to do, he kept on speeding up a little bit, slowing down when I asked him to, I think he was confused because my seat was not banging in the saddle. His trot was smooth enough so that I did not feel like I was damaging my brain or spinal cord, which was the reason I had refused to sit his trot before. Progress! Of course it will take a while before I feel his back is strong enough for me to sit fully at the slow trot, which will probably take a few more months of gentle work.

The timing for all of this is going to work out. Debbie's stable was getting ready for the show at her barn today so I did not do my homework ride on Friday. I can get stronger physically IF I TAKE MY TIME at it. This week just one 5 minute session at two-point, next week I might get up to two. I do not know if I'll get to ride tomorrow, but I'd rather that Cider gets to heal her wrenched pastern joint so I will not mind if it rains tonight like it is supposed to. After all we are both little old ladies, creaky and all.

Have a great ride!

Jackie Cochran