resistance bands for riding?

A couple days ago a friend reached out about a clinic she was hosting featuring Molly Kinnamon and the Equiformance Posture Sling system. Apparently she'd had some last minute cancellations, and did I want to come?

I did a quick gut check (and a little googling haha), and decided, why yes! I would like to come!

strapped in and handcuffed haha

The clinic venue was super close to where Charlie lives, the gadget seemed interesting, and Molly is a pretty legit rider who I wouldn't mind emulating haha. So, off we went!!

I figured there was maybe a small chance it'd be like a pyramid scheme type thing where the whole purpose of the clinic was to sell riders this gadget.... But I trust the friend who invited me and knew a lot of the other folks who were doing lessons too. And luckily that was not at all the case anyway haha.

preparing the torture devices

So. The clinic was billed as being a lesson predominantly for the rider -- but actually Charlie ended up getting a bit of a run for his money too. In a good way, tho, I think.

Molly's kiiiiiinda a badass rider

Molly started by watching us do an unguided warm up for a few minutes, where we trotted and cantered around for her to get a sense of how we go. Which.... Well, you all already know how we go haha.

Charlie was a little sluggish and I did all manner of contortions and interpretive dance moves to get him going.

charlie was an absolute pro chillin at the trailer while i watched the earlier lesson

Then, out came the bands! Basically, the idea is that the gadget - the Equiformance Posture Sling system (essentially giant rubber bands) - operate by squaring and stabilizing the rider's position in the saddle, from shoulders through hips to heels.

this flashy young thang was a hard act to follow lol

It kinda holds you in a position where your hip angle is more open with shoulders open and upright stacked on top of your torso, if that makes sense. It also felt like it really sat me in the saddle, vs the sorta tipping forward half seat thing I like to do.
 

but we tried! 

Molly wanted to see me loosen my entire leg from hip to heel, and push down on the bands. She said I've essentially trained Charlie to lean on my leg, to push into it, when in reality I need to take it all the way off.

She said the tight closed leg is actually what's blocking Charlie from stepping up and under, and that I need to "open the channel," and bump him up when he needs to go, rather than nag.

This is... obviously not new information haha. In fact, it's reflective of basically every lesson with dressage trainer C ever. The difference tho, is that the band helped me feel what my legs were doing. It gave me something different to push against instead of Charlie's side, and also gave a different feeling when I let the leg get curled up again.

Obvi the bands aren't a silver bullet, they didn't just majikally eradicate this lifelong habit... But possibly they helped my muscles get started on learning a new way?

lol emma... these things that you do, don't

Moving up from the legs, we get to the torso. Which... well, it's all related. I want to grip with my legs, which pops my seat out of the saddle and tips my torso forward. Esp in canter transitions, I reeeeeeally feel like I have to make big moves in the saddle to get Charlie to go.

When... In reality, those big moves are specifically blocking his forward. Again, this is not new information (haha, who remembers my last lesson with Isabel and Stephen Birchall where we worked on nearly this exact same thing??).

And again, the bands didn't fix it or entirely prevent my dance moves. But I could feel what was happening in a new way -- and maybe develop more awareness?

d'aww charles, good boy

Then naturally, from the torso we get to the shoulders and arms. Molly observed how I try to do all the work of the connection with my hands and fingers, including all manner of wiggling around and breaking my wrists and various other shenanigans.

She wanted me to really surrender to the bands and let my shoulders be pulled down and back, with my elbows hanging down and back too. She said to imagine I was holding a ball between my wrists. Then actually put another resistance band around my wrists, such that I was holding my hands maybe close to 12" apart, against the band, but with the side effect of bringing my elbows back closer to my body.

still trying to break my wrist even with the handcuffs

My forearm and hands were essentially supposed to be neutral conduits to the elbows, which hung down from the shoulders (rather than carried floating forward like I want), and here was where my connection to the bridle should live.

Again, say it with me here: not new information. Basically a pretty solid flashback to my first dressage lesson at Hilltop, actually. Just a new way to help me actually achieve the correct feeling, so that hopefully I can reproduce it again on my own.

Because we allllll know that *knowing* a thing is not the same as *doing* a thing. And doing the things is hard, it turns out, haha.

it's not a silver bullet by any means, but it helped me "feel" 

The most interesting feeling came in the canter. Molly described how you would jump on a trampoline -- you wouldn't hunch forward with feet together to jump up and down. No, you'd have legs set apart with body upright to jump up and down on the trampoline. You can see her demonstrating these positions in the first few moments of the video, actually.

Thinking about that while wearing the bands in canter really helped me get a different feeling in how I sit the canter -- something that's been a struggle for... hm, oh, ya know... forever lol. So it was really cool to maybe finally feel what it's like when I'm closer to where I should be.

"are we there yet?" - charlie, probably

So essentially, the rider takeaways match exactly with what every other trainer ever has told me lol. I have bad hands and clingy legs, whoops! But maybe now I also have a feeling for improving.

Thinking about "holding a ball between my wrists" while keeping my elbows back and down is really helpful. Rather than trying to wiggle my hands all around and take the contact to Charlie, I need to just set myself and let him come to me there. Likewise, creating the channel for his body with a loose leg pushing down is another sensation we hopefully made progress on.

video featuring the world's biggest sweet potato

For Charlie, the lesson was actually a lot more work than I expected. Molly agreed with every dressage judge ever in saying he needed more activity behind. And thus proceeded to "be the activity" for Chuck, much to his immense dismay lol.

She spent a fair portion of the lesson tickling and teasing him with the dressage whip to create more energy while I worked on my position and not nagging. Charlie.... eh... he did not love this lol. In a way it was actually super reminiscent of his first ever ground work lesson after I got him, where we worked on applying pressure to get a forward response.

Then, once we were really going, we moved into a canter exercise that seemed specifically designed to bring Charlie's inner dinosaur-stuck-in-tar-pit back from extinction. We'd canter halfway down the long side, then halt, then half turn to the outside to reverse direction, and as he was just finishing the turn (with inside leg stepping under), cue immediately for canter again. Rinse, repeat, again and again (all in video).

Guys, this was a challenging exercise for Charlie (and me too obvi lol). It's got all the elements to really push his buttons, especially with someone hassling him from the ground with a whip haha.

would rather be trail riding <3

Bless him, tho, not only did he hold it together, but he really really tried. Even when I was blocking him or making mistakes, he just kept going and trusted that even tho this puzzle kinda sucked, there would probably be an answer in it somewhere. Which is 100% not a thing he could have done even just a couple years ago. So, good boy Charlie!!

I liked that exercise a lot too, but need to think a little bit about how to replicate it on my own sans band (or someone on the ground keeping me honest about my position).

All in all, actually, I'm really looking forward to my next ride to see how much of these feelings I can reproduce, or whether I feel a difference at all.

The resistance bands were a really interesting experience, possibly one I'll repeat again. Mostly tho, what I appreciated most about this lesson was how immediately it zeroed in on my core positional issues and how they relate to Charlie's ability to go forward. If the bands can help me make progress there, I'll call it a win lol!