Correct Position for Riding Astride
Much as I disapprove of most women using the cross-saddle, yet, as this book is intended to be a somewhat complete treatise on riding for women, and as many women insist on using the cross-saddle, and as in some parts of the West, and in roughing it, riding must be astride if at all, I shall make a few suggestions about the way in which a woman can best attempt to do this, though it is something in which she can rarely, if ever, attain perfection.
The saddle for cross riding generally used by women in the East is the same as a man’s, although some makers are offering a cross-saddle especially adapted for women (see illustration, [page 155]). These saddles are built more on the lines of an army saddle, having more dip and a straighter flap than those for men.
Many men, and nearly all hunting men and polo players, use plain flap saddles; that is, without rolls and cut well forward so as to give plenty of room for the knees (see illustration, [page 155]). This type of saddle enables the rider to have his knees well up and forward and gives him a very firm seat for jumping. Few women, however, are long enough in the legs from the knee up to take this seat, so most women will find a roll flap saddle more comfortable.
In the West the Mexican type of saddle is generally used. This saddle has a high pommel, or even a high horn in front and a very high cantle serving as a back rest, making what is practically a “dished out” seat, far better suited to a woman’s conformation than the English saddle. The Mexican type of saddle, however, is not adapted to a horse with a square trot, but only to the loping or fox trotting horses of the West. The reason for this is that in posting or rising to the trot, the knees should be quite well up and forward, and the Mexican saddle is so built that in it one cannot take this position.
There are two distinct types of seats recognized in this country which may be called, for distinction, the military and park seats; the former is the correct seat for the saddle of the Mexican type. In this seat the rider sits upright with the legs almost straight, the knees scarcely bent, and the ball of the foot resting on the iron, with the leather very long. In fact, many military riders have their legs perfectly straight and their toes down. This seat is comfortable only on the “five-gaited” horses; that is, horses whose gaits are the single foot, the lope, the canter, the pace, but whose trot, instead of being the smart square trot of the Eastern park hack, is more of a running walk and is known as the “fox trot.” With a horse that has a true, square trot, it will be found, as I have
said, that posting is both difficult and tiring with this military seat and it is ill adapted for jumping anything over two feet in height. In the military seat the trot is taken up from the ankles, so that the knees are slipping up and down, while in the park seat posting or rising is done from the knees, which should remain in the same position at all times.
The “Cowboy” Western Costume and Saddle