Will They Catch That Critical Break?

I`ve been working with a talented group of twenty something year old event riders who have so many of the requisite qualities to become very good indeed. But they lack one big piece of the puzzle. Do any of you remember from “Star Wars” when Han Solo`s Millenium Falcon made “the jump into hyperspace”, that pedal to the metal blastoff that took the ship from the realm of the ordinary into an almost ethereal state?

This “jump into hyperspace” seems a perfect analogy for the really good but struggling rider who catches the break of attracting the attention, and the subsequent sponsorship, of someone who can afford to buy the kinds of horses that can blast that rider into a new plane of existence. Think Kim Severson BEFORE Winsome Adante, or for that matter, AFTER Winsome Adante, compared to WITH Winsome Adante.

The riders I teach aren`t from families who can scour the globe for those elite horses, who have huge farms, personal trainers, none of that. They work hard for what they get, and, because it`s hard and slow, they measure out their small triumphs in coffee spoons rather than in silver buckets. None is a charming boy with the requisite beaming smile or foreign accent. They may not understand networking, or working a crowd. They don`t have “champions” to pave their way.

The eventing world is full of these good, talented, driven, hard working, brave riders, as are the other various disciplines, but the stern reality is that catching that break can seem very random, and elusive.

The question that they must ask themselves in their reflective moments is how long can they keep grinding away when there`s nothing on the horizon that looks much like land in sight. If they keep plugging, there`s no assurance that they will get access to wonderful horses, but if they quit plugging, it`s a virtual guarantee that they won`t. So what to do, and how long to do it?

The biggest key is becoming very, very good, so good that they win consistently on whatever they sit on. And learning to be friendly to everybody. Nobody wants to sponsor even a talented grouch. But it`s still pretty random, and I sometimes think back to the Le Goff and De Nemethy USET days when the Team could talent search and dole out elite horse to those identified as having elite potential. But those days are gone, and sponsors these days don`t sponsor “The Team”, they sponsor a rider who is trying to make “the Team.”

So what should they do? No magic answers from me, just a personal thought. Try and try to become the best rider in America. Sit the trot until you and the horse become one entity. See your distances. Be tough and brave and fit, and turn yourself into such an elite and athletic rider that you force yourselves onto the radar screens of those you need to reach. MAKE them want to help you, because you are just that good.

A Very Modest Idea—About Human Fitness

At Hitching Post last weekend, it`s easy to see about 8-10 cross country jumps from the knoll where most spectators gather. It`s also easy to see that many of the riders get tired, especially galloping up and down those steep hills, so tired, in fact, that instead of being able to maintain a galloping position, up off their horses` backs, some ride the course as if sitting on a chair.

Adult amateurs, and some kids as well, aren`t strong enough, or fit enough, to safely and competently ride the cross country phase of an event, because, as the saying goes, “they run out of gas.”

I know that there are 1001 reasons and excuses that we all make about why we aren`t better athletes. We are parents of time absorbing kids. We have full time sedentary jobs. We commute two hours a day to work. We are so tired when we get home at night we have no energy left over. We are old. We are recovering from injury or illness. We just don`t have the time or the energy or the whatever to do any more than we already do.

But that`s not really true, except, insofar as we make it true. What IS true is that we have made inactivity a habit, and the only way to break out of one habit is to create a different habit. I call this “A Very Modest Idea”, because my idea isn`t to join a gym to pump iron, or to need special equipment, or to do sit ups or push ups, or to gallop racehorses, or any of that. No, it`s to start, today, by adding 15 minutes of WALKING to what we normally would do. That`s it, nothing more. You absolutely do have, somewhere in the next 24 hours an available 15 minutes that you would normally have spent sitting, to walk instead.

Walking means that you go for a walk, or climb the stairs in your office building instead of using the elevator, or walk down the corridor at the airport between flights, or walk around  your house, or park farther away from where you work, or SOMETHING to get you started on a new routine. Make yourself do this every day for a few weeks, just 15 little minutes out of the 1,440 per day. Then add 5 minutes. Then add 5 more, at some point. See where it goes. Maybe you`ll walk faster, at some point. Or walk up some inclines, or add more minutes, but the point is to do something more physical than you do now.

Sitting is a treacherous habit. It ruins our athletic abilities.  It ruins our health. It`s not easy to change a habit. (“Habits begin as cobwebs, and end up as cables.”) So don`t try anything so dramatic that you know there`s no way you`ll keep it up. Fifteen minutes every day, that`s it, for now. Three five minute walks. Five three minute walks. You can do this.

The Barn Rat Route

Unlike their furry grey namesakes, these barn rats come in various shapes, ages and sizes, the most common being girls between the ages of about ten or eleven to somewhere in the mid to late teens. They are reasonably easy to identify in their native habitat, which is any variant of horse barn.

Barn rats are the horse crazy kids who don`t want to be anywhere else. Not the mall, not the fast food joint, not even(sometimes) the Junior Prom, if there`s a horse show the next day.

Some barn rats get paid, but many trade work for the chance just to be in the general vicinity of horses. The parents of barn rats can`t be the obsessive kind who drag their kids from piano lessons to French lessons to figure skating lessons to soccer practice, because implicit in the definition of “barn rat” is is that they spend most free moments after school, on weekends, and on vacations, at the barn.

Barn rats are not the kids who arrive at the stable, take their lessons or ride their horses, get back in the car and disappear. A kid doesn`t have to be “from the poor side of town” to be a card carrying barn rat, because it`s  state of mind more than  socio economic status that differentiates the real deal from the pretender. True barn rats would hang around the barn and do manual labor even if they won the lottery, because that`s what taking care of horses really means.

What barn rats get in return, although they may not put a name to the concept, is that they learn by osmosis. By spending so much time with horses, and not just on their horses backs, they gradually learn what makes horses tick. They learn what horses eat. They learn what constitutes a clean stall. They learn about turn out, blanketing, and how to do it without getting kicked, about grooming, braiding, hoof care, supplements, medicines, tack care, types of bits, helping the farrier, the vet, the myriad small and large details that make up “horsemanship.”

Some, not all, get the chance to ride. The avid riders, especially those who show some natural skill, may get to ride lots of horses that the less obsessive customers don`t want to do for themselves. Some of the top USET riders in all the disciplines got their basic skills by the barn rat route.

In 2012 there are many pressures against barn rat-ism, a big one being the fear of the barn owner against litigation if the child should get injured. Parents may not think that it`s a good avenue toward college acceptance, letting their kids hang out all hours at the barn. But still,  for all the pressures against, being a barn rat is probably the surest way to gain the necessary skills that those we admire as “real horsemen and real horsewomen” all possess.