Hahaha- no joke! Two saddles in one week, eh? Stacie didn't know how right she was in the comments yesterday.
Just 48 hours ago, even I had no idea I'd be buying a Dressage saddle this week. And the dramatic way it went down ended up being a fitting conclusion to my TWENTY-FIVE MONTH LONG Dressage saddle search.
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This does make me giggle, I'll be honest
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See, I've been saddle searching for longer than I've been riding with CGP, so she didn't know about my...saga. On Saturday after my lesson, I told her the whole story and about my working theory that Connor prefers the short tree points and flexible front panels of the CWD. "Can I look at it?" she asked. She never had taken it off his back and handled it before.
After inspecting it she said "Oh my gosh, I've never seen a saddle with these features before. This is brilliant, I think your theory is exactly right, and I think Kate [the Society of Master Saddlers' fitter I worked with two years ago and absolutely adored] can do this and all of your other requests. Patrick Saddlery can build anything custom." She ended up taking a 5 minute video demonstrating everything and sent it to her.
On Sunday, I got a text. "Hey, Kate can do everything on your list, and she just happens to be driving through here tomorrow. Can you get back here by 8am Tuesday?" Kate lives many states away and is normally only in our area in spring and fall, so it was a dang miracle that she just happened to be passing through two days after I talked to CGP.
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This place again??
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So I took Tuesday morning off, we drove over Monday night after work, I crashed with my friend Nicole for the second time in 3 days, and at 8am sharp on Tuesday, we met with Kate.
The first saddle I rode in was Patrick's brand new monoflap with Velcro blocks, which was one of my wish list items. No, scratch that: that was a must-have. I have commitment issues with fixed blocks on *mumblemumble* thousand dollar saddles. Velcro AND monoflap or bust.
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It has like a pocket on the front of the saddle for the block, but the rest of the flap is a mono
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But this saddle had long tree points, and while Connor did everything I asked in it, I recognized that feeling I know well by now, where he'll begrudgingly do what I ask, but it's not as effortless to ask for or for him to perform as a given movement is when I ask for it bareback or in the CWD.
It was especially obvious in the reinback and ToH. The Jen of a year ago, less skilled and less certain in my convictions of what "right" feels like, might have settled for it. After all, he was Doing The Thing, right? But I stayed firm on my working theory: I knew he was capable of Doing The Thing more easily, more freely, and better. I pushed Kate to let me try something with more shoulder freedom.
She came back with a saddle that had short points and long gussets, and it took less than a minute. I walked, trotted and did a single reinback, and Kate said "Wow, I see it! I just got goosebumps, that reinback! I know exactly what you're talking about now, you're exactly right about the short points and shoulder freedom."
She didn't have many saddles with her because this wasn't an actual saddle fitting trip, but she knew one of my teammates had a saddle with short points and short gussets, and she ran out to ask if she could borrow it.
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Teammate just happens to be 5'2 and maybe 120lbs so it wasn't an awful fit for me
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For the first time in this whole saddle search, the angels actually sang, for both of us, when I rode in my teammate's saddle. Every single movement I asked for was effortless. His breastplate stayed up with almost no effort. Kate was practically cheering. "This is why I make such a point to really listen to the rider, you know your horse better than anyone," she said. "I live for these moments."
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SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY
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Afterward, I told her Mary's parting words to me which were "Don't let that fitter sell you a saddle with long tree points," and Kate said "She was right. I normally cringe when I see French saddles because they're often fitted poorly, but Mary knows what she's doing, the fit of your jump saddle is brilliant. If she ever wants to get back into saddle fitting, I would give her a job and train her. She's good."
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Side note, I was low-key anxious Kate was going to tell me the CWD didn't fit and I would have, I dunno, thrown myself off a building if she had. So the fact that she approved of its fit so thoroughly felt AMAZING. I can continue joking I would sell this horse before I sold this saddle.
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Hearing all that from one of the best fitters in the country (objectively - she's certified in the UK through a many year process on saddle fitting that we don't have an equivalent for in the US) felt so, so, SO good - that Mary's brilliance was recognized by an accomplished pro, that Mary and I were both right, and that I wasn't crazy for sticking with #dressageinajumpsaddle this long and standing up for my horse.
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"Short gusset" refers to the pillowy looking thing on the front of the saddle not going down as far as it could.
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So in the end, what did Connor need?
- Short tree points, to give the big meaty part of his shoulder as much room as possible to push back as each foreleg swings back toward the tail
- Short front gusset, for less bulk behind the shoulder
- No point billet. His billets need to come off of the waist of the saddle straight down to an anatomic girth because of where his girth groove is and how much he hates his shoulder being restricted. We only did up the point billets in the demo saddles enough to keep them from getting in the way of my feet, the only tight billet was the rear one.
- Short-ish seat. I joke he's a dachshund, but he's still a pony with a relatively short back.
- Serge panels, to allow for maximum give again for his shoulders, among other benefits
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An example of a serge panel, which is entirely wool on the underneath of the panels. They are warmer in the winter, don't get damaged by sweat like leather panels, conform better to the horse's back and most interestingly, they can be directly adjusted through the panel using tools, which I thought was cool.
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And in the end, what did I need?
- Velcro blocks on a monoflap - non-negotiable. See previous statement re: commitment issues and also my barrel-shaped horse and my short little legs.
- A stupid short flap. I don't know what the actual length will end up being, but she's taking a ton off the bottom and front of the flap as shown on my teammate's saddle above. I think my exact words were "What's the shortest we can go without causing problems anywhere?"
- A well-balanced saddle and a good fitter that understands biomechanics and Dressage riders and will come to this farm twice a year to adjust it
That's it. That's all I needed.
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My saddle is going to have a lot less of that useless extra bit of flap sticking out down there, since I have shorter femurs than this teammate, and I also have a pony instead of the imported 16hh+ WB this saddle was made for.
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I spent the rest of Tuesday designing it (since it's custom, there's one flat fee and no upcharges on anything you can dream of - this is harder than it sounds!), plunked down a deposit, and now we wait approximately 8-10 weeks, COVID-willing.
I have more thoughts on this, but this post is long enough! I am SO EXCITEDS!!!
