Core strength, "dinosaur tails"

Core strength is what creates "stillness" in the rider from the inside (and yes the horse!)and allows the suppleness which I discussed in my earlier post. Rigidity is what happens if you don't have enough core strength to balance on the moving horse (owners who moved up from their little TB and QHorses to giant moving warmbloods can attest!) Without core muscles to stabilize you, you have to seize up every other muscle in your body in a futile attempt to achieve a "still" and "deep" seat. The stillness is the attachment of your sitz bones to the saddle, the suppleness is in your hip joints which rotate around a good inch higher than your sitz bones which are the bottom of your pelvis. To find your hip joints push your fingers into the crease created by your upper leg folding up against your pelvis( this is called the groin),ok about 1/2 way between your pubic bone and the bony knobble that pokes out on the side of your leg (the one that gets sore if you lay on your side for too long on a hard surface!)you will feel your hip sockets. Note how free they are to move when you are sitting in the saddle on your sitz bones. Find these by sitting on your hands and rolling around a bit - hard bony knobbles which form the bottom of your pelvic bowl (the "outer bowl")

Entire classes are taught on just this topic with many ideas about how to best create a program of movement for the student that encourages symmetrical core stability. These are your "self carriage" muscles and without them your horse won't have them either. The psoas and iliopsoas are the two big players and the good news is you don't need to remember the names, only how to engage them! Following my Alexander training I often describe the "outer bowl": this is your pelvic bowl with the, all important seat bones on the bottom, a sacrum behind, illiac crests(hip bones) at the top and an open front with your pubic bone at the bottom of the front opening. It is lined with a sheet of muscle called the "inner bowl" and it is this tricky muscle that is the key! You can engage it by attempting to bring your top, front 'hip bones'(the ones you prop a bag of groceries on) together toward each other. You are not using your outer bowl muscles and "pinching your cheeks", quite the contrary, for riding you want relatively open and relaxed buttocks, and you are using your inner bowl or deep abdominal muscles to move your pelvic bowl with it's sitz bone bottoms. It is this motion of pelvic bowl/sitz bones that enables you to first follow and then direct your horse - this is the key to a "good seat". there are lots of other ways to help you to identify and strengthen these muscles, and I have included below a link to yet another tool.

I must also point out that the outer bowl has a tail and if you pretend that it is a nice long dinosaur tail(instead of the little vestige of a stub that you actually have) Your "dino tail" hangs down to the ground a couple of feet behind you and helps you to maintain a level balance with your pelvis.

I have, not often enough, told students to practice standing on one leg to improve their core strength, or to use my Balimo chair (in my tackroom under my desk). Now I have found a new piece of equipment in my favorite store, Costco! (I took my shoes off and played on the demo for a good 15 min before shelling out the $95.00 for this little gem) click here to link to the website. I will bring this out to the barn when Alexander training is over and you can play around with it but I encourage anyone who wants to improve their balance for any reason, to go run to Costco and play for a while - just the one leg at a time standing is a challenge, and using the elastic stabilizer hand pulls is perfect for riders as it encourages you to keep your arms down by your hips - a phrase often heard by all of you "elbows on the front of your hips and ride him/her forward through them with your seat and leg". With core strength you can be supple and quiet while directing the dance! Simple not easy. j