Compare riding to other sports...

Riding horses is probably one if the most complex sports out ther, as we app know! But have you ever tried comparing it to other sports? Well, I was an ice skater, and I love to watch snowboarding and I see alot of similarities in the two sports to jumping horses.

Ice Skating- you want to have a good speed going to the jump, but not try to speed up or slow down right before take off. You want to remain in compleate control of your body in the air, and land at the same speed you took off at. You also have to really train yourself in body awarness, so you can isolate different parts of you body at a time.

Snowboarding- You have to aproch the jump at the exact line you see, and ride that line at a steady pace, then you have to stay intotal control in the air, balancing in a flip or twist.

What other sports(anything) can you compare to riding?

Riding is hard to compare you have to control every movement on a 1000 pound animal and at the same time keep your blance and posture correct. Honestly alot of people can't control the powerful animals that we ride. AND not look like a complete idiot.

Well, I bet no one on here could do a 1260 in a half pipe, land a triple axle, back country ski/board pow, or do any other sport for that matter and not look stupid...

Hehe yeah. There are plenty of sports harder than horseback riding.

Yeah there are sports harder than horseback riding, but some of them are not realistic. You have to be crazy talented to do horseback riding for example. Or gymnatics, I mean I am not flexible so gymnatics is out of the question. But for gymnastics you need control, balance, and ability. Which is what you need for riding. For volleyball its mostly strength and confidence. You absolutly need strength and confidence for riding horses. I really like this thread alot just to let you know StormyBlues. Very creative!

I think like ballet possibly is related to horseback riding. You are trying to balance on one leg in ballet sometimes, and you need to balance on the horse. Plus, I think ballet would use a lot of leg strength.

I used to windsurf in my younger days. In my humble opinion I was pretty good. I compare it to ridiing in that you have to have excellent balance, be able to stay on a fast moving object and be at the mercy of a wild thing, wind or horse.

Really good one!! Ballet and figure skating are so in commen, that pro skaters usually do ballet too.

Thanks sonny!!

Tasia- I want you to go look up Danny Kass, Shaun White, Sasha Cohen and look at what they are doing. It's insane.

yes, and when you are doing any type of dancing it it takes crazy core strentgh, which is very useful in riding, and in dancing you have to be aware where every piece of you body is, which is handy in riding. :)

Core strength was HUGE in skating!!!!!