Cob Jockey

Now back to our regularly scheduled programming.

Disco ended up spending three weeks at his breeder's in May and June, and covered four mares. He got a glowing report card - he was good to handle, good to the mares, and "stopped when I said stop" which is "the most important thing".

Disco and his breeder, Lisa

He also stayed at a good weight thanks to some very careful nutrition management on my part before he left, and on Lisa's while he was there. Maintaining a good weight isn't easy for an active breeding stallion anyway, and doubly so when I realized he went through a growth spurt while he was there.

My eye was immediately drawn to his withers when I picked him up - where did THOSE come from? In three weeks he grew a centimeter, and his topline is now a completely foreign shape to me. Or wait, is it familiar...

I brought him home a few days before we had a Wow fitter coming to visit, and opted to not even try to ride until she had a chance to evaluate his saddle fit.

She is a wonderful fitter and is a Wow specialist, but works on all kinds of saddles. She's coming back this fall if anyone local wants to get on the schedule.

She said his flat tree still suits him (phew, that's the most expensive part), but she did think he needed a slightly different headplate (3U instead of 3UU) and that he no longer needed tabbed panels. Tabs lower the contact surface at the front of the panel for a wide horse, and to my utter shock, Disco isn't a wide horse anymore.

I wasn't done being shocked. When she evaluated Connor (the first time he's been evaluated by a Wow professional), she said he could really do with a flat tree too. And that he and Disco are currently the exact same size in every part.

I joked when I bought a baby out of Connor's full sister that I was hoping genetics was on my side in terms of Disco fitting into the same saddles as Connor, but Lisa's herd tends to have two back shapes: native pony flat-and-wide or easily-shares-saddles-with-warmbloods. Connor has always been in the latter camp, and up to this point I thought Disco might be in the first. Can you blame me? Look at these photos from when he came home 7 months ago:

No withers here, ma'am, just a potato. (November 2024)

I tried Connor's saddles on him back in November, and the fit was terrible:

In Disco's own saddle, he's gone down from being a 4U headplate/borderline 5 headplate, to a 3U in the last 7 months.

November 2024, 4U headplate

And finally, the whole thing is a love letter to Wow. Renske said I needed a different panel shape for him now, and instead of getting a whole new saddle or new panels, I just took my spare pair of no-tab DXWG Size 1 panels out of the office, we swapped those onto the saddle and spent a half hour getting the flocking (air) just right. Boom, done. No matter which dimension he grows in and which direction he grows in, the saddle will keep changing with him.

25 minutes of w/t/c is EXHAUSTING guys, but look at that saddle fit.

As I totally didn't cover in my previous post, on canter night I started to suspect that Disco's saddle wasn't fitting well. His body language was tense and angry, and I felt a pressure point behind his shoulders, as well as a real asymmetry. As an in-the-moment fix, I shimmed it with a half-pad which made him feel just better enough to get us through.

Afterward, I grabbed the Wow saddle fitting gauge we have and discovered that he's gone DOWN two headplate sizes, with all other components staying the same. 

This makes some sense: I know he's grown 3.5cm in the last 6 months, that he has visually sprouted withers, and that I can't make jokes about him being shaped like a potato anymore. Still - I didn't expect him to go down, and I was grateful to have the gauge to confirm that for me.

Not happy.

I got the headplate swapped out and also reset my Flair panels to atmospheric air pressure before going through the slow, methodical reinflating process as best I could without a second set of hands to do it while I was in the saddle, which is best practice. 

And...

It was like I had a different horse. One I had never felt before.

WHO IS THIS HORSE.

At least on straight lines where he could more easily balance, he was forward, he was moving over his back, he was reaching for the bit. He was TAKING ME, finally, which we have been working on for so long.

I felt bad that he had been suffering with a poorly fitting saddle for at least a few months, but I felt vindicated that with Wow, fixing it was as easy as re-measuring him and then spending a half hour in the office swapping out parts. I really don't know how I'd do the young horse journey without it! 

Look at those ears! What a change.

I'm not glad it happened, but I'm grateful that it taught me some things about Disco that I needed to know: that his default response to "something isn't right" is to go #slugmode, and that (I had already been gathering data on this one) he is not at all stoic about pain, which I am so grateful for after Connor, who would rather suffer in silence than let me know something is wrong.

There's still more adjustment that needs done the next time I have a second set of hands, particularly for balance, but I already felt so much more secure and balanced in it even though it was dumping me out the back a bit, and it paid off during the ride: I was much more able to influence his body parts than I have been lately.

Shame Pivo cut off his head here, he was going so cute.

That's it - I officially am all-in on Wow. It is so much kinder to the horses to be able to make adjustments like these on the fly rather than waiting for a saddle fitter, or experimenting with different saddles forever. I'm going to be setting a recurring task on my to-do list to re-measure him every month from here on out so that I can stay on top of changes like this while he finishes growing.

As you all know, a few months ago I gambled that Eva and Disco might be the same tree size and shape when I bought a saddle for Eva by way of a blogger. Drumroll please...

Wow, did THAT ever pay off. It sits beautifully on him. And in a stroke of perfect timing, the original panels just got back from my fitter, who I paid $145+shipping to add the missing feature to them to ensure that that didn't cause pressure points.

Mmmmm, the way the panel follows the shoulder is so delicious.

While I was trying that on him, I also tried a couple of Connor's other saddles on him, even though I knew they would be all wrong. I just had to know.

My beloved CWD looked like a tiny little hat on top of his withers. But it's getting lots of use on Connor these days between his part leaser and the two kids that ride him regularly, so it will be sticking around.

And the Patrick, as suspected, is also a big no. Connor and Disco are different back-to-front tree shapes, and even when the Patrick was built, when Connor was at his fittest, Connor was narrower and had more of a wither than Disco. Disco may yet sprout some wither, since he's only 3.5, but not enough where this saddle will ever fit, and I'm at peace with that.

I've known for a while I should sell it. It's still nearly new, since I all but retired Connor a few months after getting it, and Connor's retired dad bod won't be using it. Seeing it on Disco was the push I needed to sell it and then plow those funds into a Wow jump saddle for him.

SO, any short legged riders out there looking for a Dressage saddle, I would be willing to make you quite a "blogger special" deal on the Patrick, especially if you save me from dealing with listing it. I only want to get out of it what it will take to get Disco a jump saddle, which is nowhere near what I paid for it.

2022 Patrick Saddlery Liberty II

17" wide monoflap

Velcro pocket for knee blocks (comes with small blocks, can order other shapes)

Extra short flap

Wool-flocked serge panels

Would best fit a horse that is wide with some wither and a semi-curved front-to-back tree profile. Will not fit a flat back.

Hit me up via the contact form on the blog if you're interested or if you know of someone who might be interested!

Lyss, formerly of Gooseback Riding and now of Chantilly Tales, commented on my blog post about Wow saddles to say that she had two barnmates that both had Wows they were looking to sell, and long story short, it ended up that one of those saddles was in my and Eva's exact specs (which are very likely to also be Disco's specs). The seller's horse had hated it and she only rode in it for a couple months before getting something else and putting it in a closet, so it was nearly new.

Not unattractive either, but those f****** blocks (we'll get to that)

Wow has three front-to-back tree shapes: curved, semi-curved and flat, with flat being the most rare, and naturally that's Eva's tree shape. Of everything on the saddle, the seat/tree is the most expensive, so it's the only thing you really want to get right. Everything else (panels, flaps, blocks, billets, headplate) can be easily/relatively cheaply swapped out later.

Because of that, I didn't ask too many questions or request hardly any photos once I learned it was a flat tree in my size. The price was fantastic, the saddle was gorgeous, and the tree was right, so I could deal with anything else being wrong. Lyss ended up facilitating the entire sale for both of us through email, which was awesome.

It wasn't until it got here and I saw the underside of it for the first time that I realized the likely reason why the seller's horse had hated it: that saddle's panels have a combination of features that my own fitter won't sell, and in fact she confiscates them anywhere she finds them, because they create a pressure point on the horse's back that she has seen lead to pain and injuries in horses many times over the years. Her words: "Do not even sit on her in those panels."

The good news? My fitter can add a stitchline to these panels to make them safe to use, AND I had just ordered new panels for Connor's Wow that are basically the same as Eva's except that they don't have tabs, which serve to lower the panel on wider horses with less withers.

Thanks to Wow being Wow, I spent 5 minutes in my living room with a screwdriver moving panels between saddles and voila, I had a saddle I could start Eva in. It fits beautifully, aside from Connor's no-tab panels sitting higher than they should on Eva.

The fit is just freaking perfect. I am in awe of that little plastic Wow saddle fitting gauge every time I see this saddle moving perfectly with Eva like it was custom made for her. Dr. M and the gauge told me what parts to look for, a blogger helped me find it, and from the moment a saddle was ever first put on her back, it fit her.

Such a lucky horse

I love it for me too. The balance is incredible and it sort of disappears underneath me. The only thing I don't love are these giant honking thigh blocks, which do move, but not enough and not in the directions that I want them to.

When I came off Eva, Kate joked that those blocks were like a pivot point for my body as I flew off, lol

Fortunately, Dr. M is both a leatherworker and a Wow enthusiast, so short term, I am just going to take the blocks off the saddle, and long term, she is going to help me fabricate a custom block. Like anything else on the saddle, the blocks are modular and are held on by two flat screws.

You can just tell my body wants these blocks out of my way. With them gone, I will be able to move the stirrup leathers forward and my leg is going to hang in a great place.

So, a big hearty THANK YOU to Lyss for helping me find this saddle. I think I am officially on the Wow train after this experience!

Brand: Bua
Cost for Fitting: $150 for 7 day trial, including shipping both ways (You do have to put a refundable 50% deposit down for the full price of the saddle, like not a hold on your credit card, but an actual charge. Do not do this with a debit card (Really don't use a debit card at all, ever, especially online, but that's a conversation for another day.))
Number of Saddles Tried at the Fitting: 1
Number of Saddles Trialed: 1 

Betcha thought we were done with this rodeo, didn't you!

Hello from the "clearly not prejudiced against ugly and weird saddles" club

I'm not actively searching for a Dressage saddle at this point. My jump saddle is getting the job done and GP trainer doesn't mind it. But that hasn't stopped me from idly wondering WHY he seems to go so much better in it than in most Dressage saddles, and I'm starting to come to the conclusion it might be the tree points.

See, my CWD jump saddle has insanely flexible and short tree points, to the point that Mary told me not to freak out about the fit when I first set it on his back. "When you girth it up, it like, goes into sport mode and lowers itself down and around his back, which means it will look too narrow when you just set it on top of his back ungirthed," she said.

Sorry for the blurry picture, but CWD takes this concept so far, they only partially sew the knee block onto the saddle. See the black gap between the block and the panel? The block is just floating there, to allow for maximum panel flexibility for the horse's shoulder.

So my working theory that he doesn't like the long tree points of most Dressage saddles, even properly fitted ones, and isn't as willing to lift his withers into them. Former saddle fitter Mary agrees. Hence, we're investigating Dressage saddles with trees (no treeless!) but with short or no or flexible tree points. Enter Bua, a relatively young Irish saddle company with a radical saddle idea: a saddle based on a cantilevered tree.

Bua (or rather US-based rep, Irish Saddles USA) does a 7 day trial for $150 and will build and send you a saddle based on photos so I said, hey, low effort, low investment, and I'll get a good blog post out of it, let's do it! There isn't much adjustment to be done on these saddles - they fit "most horses" and on request, they can send you multiple types of panels. Mine came with a mesh covered/foam flocked set, and a leather covered/wool flocked set.

Wool on the left, foam on the right. The wool ones have a zipper so that you can adjust flocking easily, although they don't allow you to mess with that in the trial.

There are a few interesting features of the Bua. First, the cantilevered tree, which I've roughly drawn the position of in red here:

This means the rider is not sitting on the same surface that is in contact with the horse's back, even though it's a single united tree. That means the saddle has a suspension, kind of like your car's, and you can stiffen or soften the suspension on-demand using the mechanism on the back of the cantle:

So if you're trail riding you might want a softer suspension, but if you're flatting you might want a stiffer suspension.

Also interesting: the weight. The whole thing clocks in at 9lbs, and I could lift it over my head without even trying. I LOVED that about it. It's absolutely the lightest saddle I've tried.

Shown hanging easily on the flimsy baby gate that serves to keep Hank out of my trash can

If you're an eventer and you buy a Bua saddle, you need only buy one saddle because you can buy both jump and Dressage flaps for it and swap them out. I had the Dressage flaps only, but I'm all for anything that lets me own fewer single-purpose tack items, so I thought that was a cool concept.

Finally, the last interesting feature is the whole reason I tried it: the complete lack of tree points. It has a tree, but the tree has no points whatsoever.

So flexy

Despite that, he went quite well in it, and from the moment I put him on the lunge to see how he went in it all the way through my Dressage ride, he was very willing to lift his back.

Me, on the other hand...

boingboingboingboingboing

In the above GIF, you'll see some of the most effortless still-crappy-but-progress half pass we've ever done, and you'll see my butt being bounced like a basketball. This is not a horse with a big bouncy trot, guys. And the saddle was in the completely ratcheted down low suspension configuration for this ride. Plus the balance was all wrong even before the thing crept over his shoulders.

Irish Saddles USA, the distributor I was working with, suggested I do the next ride with the wool panels to see if that prevented the saddle from slipping, and changing out the panels took me all of 2 minutes after watching a YouTube video. You just undo a strap with a button fastener, slide the panel off, slide the new panel on, and re-fasten the strap.

Shown with one panel removed

The wool panels helped quite a bit, the saddle didn't creep forward at all for my second ride, but I still found the balance all wrong - it was way too high in the pommel and way too low in the cantle, setting me back on my "pockets". I also felt very high off the horse and like the saddle was somewhat unstable laterally.

Pommel too high, but look at that fit along his shoulder. Not many saddles fit this closely on him.

By this point I had a feeling the saddle wasn't for me, and the biggest reason? I found my seat aids very ineffective in it. For example, normally my canter depart aid is lifting my inside seatbone, but that aid must have not been getting through because I had to back it up with leg. And the suspension would have been welcome on a trail ride, but was not helping me in the Dressage ring.

That said, I still asked them if there was anything we could do to improve the front-to-back balance of the saddle, and they said no, and with that plus the seat aids thing, they told me this might not be the saddle for me. I appreciated the honesty and how easy they were to work with.

Really though, this balance ain't right

So what's the bottom line here? This isn't the saddle for me, but this was also not a waste of time and money. He did go better in it. That IS a datapoint to support my theory that he doesn't like long tree points, and he seems to prefer a less-well-fitting saddle with no/short/flexible tree points over a well-fitting saddle with long ones, like my old CWD Dressage.

Long tree points are HARD on a horse shaped like Connor

Do I think Bua is a bad saddle? I do not. I think they really have a good concept from a horse welfare standpoint. There's no denying Connor went better with me suspended over his back rather than sitting on top of it, that model just doesn't work for my sport. 

If my horse was in a medium tree or smaller and I never had to sit the trot, I would definitely give Bua a legitimate shot. And I desperately wish I could combine the rider-focused Eq Saddle Science saddle with the horse-focused Bua saddle to create One Saddle to Rule Them All. No one's asking my opinion though.

The rep was great to work with and answered all of my many questions promptly, so if you're curious about trying one, I can very much recommend working with Irish Saddles USA!

It absolutely kills me to write these words, but I also definitely knew it was coming.

My saddle doesn't fit.

March 2020

I mean, nobody is surprised. The CWD was always "good enough" in terms of fit, but not perfect, and Homeskillet porked out like a cow on a feedlot while in training. Plus, as JenJ always says, no saddle is forever. Toward the end of training, CGP said she thought he was resisting lifting and sitting because of the saddle, which is exactly, verbatim, what and when the fitter that reflocked the CWD last spring said would happen with this saddle.

January 2021. It's subtle, but if you look at the angle of the knee roll, you can see the top of the knee roll is now tilted slightly back toward his tail, and if you look at the back panel, you can tell it's lifted up a bit. Both signs that it's now too narrow.

(Can I just get an "Praise Jesus!" that I didn't spend let's-not-talk-about-it money on the Patrick one year ago and instead bought the $2,000 CWD instead? The price difference between the CWD and the Patrick is more than what I ended up paying for 3.5 months of full training, so that money ended up where it needed to be spent for sure.)

Last week I reached out to Connor's former owner and blogland's favorite saddle fitter/body worker Tara to start the process of saddle fitting with her, because 1. I really trust her, and 2. Any of Frank Baines monoflap Dressage saddles can be made with a Velcro block, which other manufacturers have flat out told me "No" on. 

Come on, this is just genius. I'm going to order mine with as many blocks as they'll sell me so CGP can adjust my leg to her heart's content.

I didn't intend for Tara to take a look at the CWD, I know it needs to go, but in the process of taking conformation photos she thought she saw it sitting a little lower on the right and asked me to place one thin shim underneath it.

Before I rode with the shim, I wouldn't have thought anything was crooked, but damn did that make a difference. And if I thought that was noticeable, I rode him bareback on Sunday and was flat out amazed at what I felt.

After shimming, sitting suspiciously straight

Bareback, he was effortlessly consistent in the contact, he didn't throw his head up for transitions or reinbacks, and lifted his back almost from the beginning of the ride. I could also clearly feel for the first time that his back does have less muscle on the right. 

So now I'm stuck with a horse I desperately want to keep in solid work so I don't lose the muscle he built with CGP, but I'm also facing a long drawn out saddle buying process and a saddle that may be actively hurting him. Which sucks, but all I can do is get that ball rolling.

Poor beefy pony

As an aside, I had a fleeting thought that I'd give the Eq Saddle Science flapless saddle a second try, because that feeling of closeness and how easy it made to ride Connor literally haunts my dreams. But...the more I thought about it, the more I'm convinced that it was the length of the panels that caused the issue last time, given the point at which the pain was most acute was right at the back corner of the panel (as diagnosed by my vet before she'd even seen the saddle). And while it might fit better now that his back isn't as banana shaped, I cannot take the risk that he'll get back pain again and set us back at this point in his training. And ESS told me last year that they won't make a shorter pony panel for me. So...that's sad, but I'm moving on. Hopefully either my next horse fits my anatomy better, or my next horse has a slightly longer back!