fat galore

In my new state of (hopefully) recovering back pain victim, ex-pregnant woman and fitness enlightened rider I have decided to officially start taking exercising classes. I am determined to try to go to the 2007 wellpride eventing championships in September - I think it would be just sooooo fun - and it would be a good endpoint from my journey that started in December (when I could not even walk).

So the challenge is not just how to fit Gym visits in my schedule but what do I wear! I went to my first group fitness class today and since my gym is in a major university, the sports center is populated by fit young bodies. Fortunately, even in this flabby state I am not shy to show it off (the Brazilian genes, I guess). With that said, I chose to no longer wear the skin tight shinny spandex - there are some shapes of some parts of myself that I prefer not to face. So sweats and t-shirt it was. But much to my surprise things have changed a lot since I was last in an aerobics class (remember jazzercise?). Today my mat was among a group of young women, who were obviously muslim, and were totally, modestly, covered - even hair. I am not sure what some of the shapes of the some of their selves were, but they were up there chugging along just like me. Heck, if they can do this without exposing a single pore, so can I in my cut off sweats! I was the oldest in the class without a doubt, but I was not in the bottom of the fitness scale... comforting for me.

The hard data came in later in the locker room: I weighed myself. I am 20 (let me spell it out T-W-E-N-T-Y) pounds heavier than pre-baby. No wonder my back is busted! My poor horse, he had to haul around all this extra Daphne in XC all last summer. But then again if I am able to shift this lard correctly I may be able to have more effective seat aids in Dressage :)

I am not sore today.... not at all - back is doing great.

Peripherally related to my back

...only perhaps in the sense that I still have all that baby weight from 18 months ago...
I couldn't resist putting this picture of my son and his pony on the blog. I hope he gets the horse disease just like his mom.

everyday

I have been riding everyday in the wee hours in the morning (my horse it is totally indoor ring sour, hugh .... snow...) AND I went to the Gym today again (!). I decided to do something physically healthy everyday from now on (aside PT) - it doesn't have to be much, but it has to be everyday (yesterday I did sets of tightening my abdominal muscles in the car while stuck in traffic). I think I am going to a jumper show next weekend. Pain ? yes but manageable.

fitness

So, now that I am a bit more educated about sports injury issues, the picture is becoming clearer that fitness in general (Gretchen and I chatted about this a while ago, but sometimes it takes me a little while to really digest stuff and fully comprehend its implications ) may be and closely related to injury. It appears that amateur riders (my fat ass included) do not keep fit enough by riding 1 hour a day 6x a week. This is really a hairy issue, I can't imagine coming up to my fellow average ammy, who is trying to balance family, career and riding: and say, hey you now need to fit in exercising in your schedule otherwise you won't improve your riding AND the probability of you getting hurt goes up ! Gosh I am not sure if I want to face this with a 10ft pole. But it looks like its true...

I have noticed that the fitness issue has not come unnoticed by the enterprising horse industry : books on yoga and riding, fitness consultant adds on the magazines, Horse Riding Fitness Equipment. Is this all commercialism? My skeptic brain just looks at all these and thinks : no way I need an artificial horse to ride my horse better. Does any of this work? Horse yoga??!! I am not sure if this is not just people trying to make a buck and not addressing the real issue of fitness. Its like selling magic diet pills to people who should just stop eating bon bons for a while. Has anyone had a good experience with any of these? I am willing to be convinced with good evidence.

In the end, it just really pees me off that training for training level is not enough to ride well AT training level ! So off to the Gym I go. AND maybe I'll stretch before hoping on.

snow

You folks down south try to contain your jealousy...

Doc's note

So I convinced my MD to blog something on Lemone's ! stay tuned, I even got a MRI picture coming...

Jumping

Yeay! it has been almost 4 months since I last jumped. I was so happy this morning to buddy up with my new eventing pals and do a fun grid. Robert gave us a great lesson -it was a blast. Lumpy was a red rocket but he was also his usual entertaining self (I often see him as a lab retriever asking: are you going to toss the ball now? now? how about now? is now good ? now? ) The whole hour was beautiful: I smiled, I made mistakes, we all laughed about needing better brakes. It is just so nice to ride with others who are as excited as me about being on top of a horse, frozen, at 8:30 on a Sunday am.

Now is evening. Now is time to pay up. Maybe this is what getting broken is all about : the price. Tonight in the menu we have an expensive tingling down the left leg accompanied by soreness on the lower back. Will I tell Gretchen that I am in pain? no sirry bob.

I rationalize all these misadventures on testing the boundaries of what I can do. I don't know what I can or can't do, and I have a limited amount of time on these disks so I gotta explore. I would hate to "under ride" for fear of injury - although I would hate to "over ride" too. But the latter is easier to tell because I hurt. The former is more elusive... how do you tell ??!!
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I sat the trot today...

I sat the trot today. That intimidating event that any beginner dreads to do in public was for me and my 30-horse-riding-years outright frightening. But Lumpy was feeling like silk and I really wanted that shoulder in right. My innards shook, my spine vibrated - perhaps it was too soon. But we made it in 3 tracks: relaxed, slightly bent around my inside leg, and steady. I did it again a couple more times to make sure it wasn't just luck.

Degenerative disc disease sucks - point blank. Back pain su-u-ucks. Riding is all about partnership, about about communication and ultimately 2 acting as one. How can it be then, that there is just so much attention in this industry to horse health and little to no attention being paid to rider health? And I don't mean to say that attention is not paid to people falling on theirs heads, or getting kicked in the groin or whatever - these are traumatic events. I mean why aren't talking about repetitive strain HUMAN injury in the horse world? As an academe I was not able to find a single reputable medical article on this. I know I am pounding on this again and again.

Well, I am home now and yes my back hurts. Anti-inflammatories here I go. Will I try again tomorrow ? absolutely. Is it dumb ? definitely. Do you blame me?