Choosing a girth

Samples of acceptable girths for the Ansür Saddle in order of preference:

1. Girths without elastic.

2. Equilizer girths.

3. Girths with elastic in the middle and not on the ends.

4. Girths with elastic only on one side.

5. Girths with elastic on both ends-one side sewn so that the elastic is not stretchy.
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This particular girth is the Professional Choice and it must be pulled apart into its two halves--they Velcro together). When they are separate, sew through the 2” black strips and the Velcro backing so there is no longer any way to stretch one side of the girth. Then the two pieces are simply stuck back together again. (This separation is how the you are supposed to clean the girth after riding. that way you don’t have to get the whole top side with buckles, elastic, etc. wet.) Goes without saying that the “sewn up” side is then used on the off side.

Test: You, the rider, puts on a leather belt to hold up your pants or as a fashion accessory. So, think about it. Do you crank it as tight as you can get it? And after you walk around a few minutes do you tighten it some more? How would that feel to you if you then had to perform athletic feats with your belt on as tight as it can be pulled? How do you think your horse feels about his girth? And we wonder why they get “cranky” at girthing time.

OK, so we need to have it snug so we can mount and not pull the saddle off to the side. Snug, but not tight is the operative term. There are riders who can mount a large horse from the ground without a girth and there are riders who have trouble getting on a small horse and can dislodge even treed saddles. Most riders are somewhere in the middle between those extremes and having the girth to stabilize the saddle when mounting is a comforting thing.

Another test: Place your fingers under the front of the saddle and have someone else tighten the girth until you say stop! That hurts! By this time your horse is rolling his eyes at how his beloved rider has managed to get their fingers stuck under his saddle. This may help you understand what “too tight” feels like.

Check to see if you can slide your fingers under the saddle in several areas at the front. If it is easy to slip your fingers under the saddle, you may tighten the girth one more hole and check again until you can get your fingers under the saddle but it’s not as easy. This is most likely tight enough. The horse needs to breathe!

If you tighten the girth too much, you will cause the saddle pad to tighten on the withers, so be careful to watch that it stays in the gullet. Those center and edge seams can cause pain. Over-tightening the girth will also change the balance of the saddle’s seat. Check that once more.

You say, so what’s wrong with my double-sided elastic girth? The rider tends to over-tighten these stretchy girths just because it’s easier and they can. Most riders tighten them so much that they aren’t stretchy anymore…which in turn stretches out the elastic and the rider tightens it once again. When the horse trots, jogs, gallops or canters, that stretchy girth acts like a bungee cord allowing the saddle to bounce up and snapping it back down. The Ansur saddles are designed to sit in contact with the horse’s back at all movements and gaits.

Try another test. Put your girth on at light to moderate adjustment—not flopping but a bit too loose for you to mount. Lunge the horse briefly at walk, trot and canter and observe how the saddle sits, moves with the horse and magically doesn’t slide off.

So the bottom line is: sit level in the middle of the horse and be safe without over tightening your girth. Then both horse and rider can enjoy the ride!

Ansur debuts new trail saddles at the 2009 Equine Affaire, Springfield, MA

Here is...the Endeavor

The 2 new Trail/Endurance models, one english-style named the Endeavor and one western-style named the Enduro are to debut soon at the 2009 Equine Affaire, MA, on 12-15 November 2009.

All the Ansur saddle models including dressage, hunter/jumper, eventing, pleasure and western of can be seen, touched, and sat-on in the Better Living Building at the Big E grounds in Springfield, MA.

If you have a horse on the grounds, you are welcome to have a test ride on your horse. Just stop by the booth and sign up.

The Endeavor is sure inspire riders around the globe who enjoy english-style saddles to go out and have fun with their horses. This new saddle can provide pain-free comfort to horse and rider while out riding the trails, be it competitively, long or short distance, endurance or purely a pleasure ride.

This is truly a versatile trail/endurance saddle with amazing rider support. The base price of the plain Endeavor with a pair of front D rings, without stirrups and leathers is $3195.

You can have tons of D-rings and strings to hang on everything imaginable you want to carry as well as the kitchen sink.

There are many options to choose from including a choice of leather color: chestnut  and dark brown  as well as black. Suede seats are also a nice option for a even more secure ride.

The choice of normal english stirrup leathers, wide straps for platform stirrups or fenders should cover everyone's individual preference.

If you want custom or a bit of bling...just ask.

The photo below is Brent, Ansur's master saddle maker out doing extensive test riding with the Endeavor to evaluate firsthand the comfort for horse and rider.

Kudos for the Excel

The Ultimate Dressage Ride

See, touch, feel, sit-on,

test ride the Ansür Excel

Booth 732-733

Better Living Building

2009 Equine Affaire

Springfield, MA

November 12-15

"I love the Excel... and so do my horses. i have tried it on my three, which are a national show horse with a broad back, a lipizzan, and a holsteiner... the holsteiner is very particular and he was just wonderful in it. (he is the one who so far has only liked your Classic model)....

I love that you have given it just enough structure to feel like a dressage saddle to the rider (in the good way) but it still seems to feel flexible to the horse. I do miss the absolute closeness the the classic gives it, but i think as a discipline-specific saddle you have really made a breakthrough! "   ~Karen Rohlf, FL

Gale Wolfe, NY, rides her Friesians in the Excel and she said:  "it's the BEST SADDLE THAT I'VE EVER RIDDEN IN!"

"The Ansur Excel is PERFECT for the Friesians. Four Friesians at my barn attest to it. I'll make one more comment.... the photos on the Ansur website do NOT do the saddle justice.

It really looks JUST like a regular dressage saddle. I show it to people and they can not believe that it is treeless. It's a GREAT saddle.

And... it fits ALL my horses, and needs no ADJUSTMENTS. I use no special pads and just plop it on any of my horses and GO!

Gale is featured as the October "Rider of the Month" on Ansur's home page.

I love my Excel! I brought my Amigo with me up to Canada to test-ride Pepper, my Rheinlander-cross Gelding, and he’s been wearing an Ansür every since. But when the brand-new Excel arrived for a test-ride, Pepper made it clear that we needed one immediately – the additional support for the rider provided me with increased confidence and a longer leg, and Pepper moves more forward with more freedom and fluidity – making us a more confident and fluid pair overall.
Thank you.      ~Vicki K. and Pepper, VA

Trainer Marcy Armstrong, Alberta Canada
"I fould the new EXCEL at Ansur. I didn't get to try it: I asked some good questions and sounded like it had what I needed. A Twist, feel like a real dressage saddle (not a bareback pad) Fits every horse, flexible, not rigid, looks good... so I got it that day.

17 H happy horse- or 1500# monster! At one clinic ( I knew I needed help!) he refused to go, he backed into walls, and he broke a $400 mirror. This was in his custom made, custom fitted saddles. This horse had historically overbent, curled behind the contact like he gave up on me. And therefore not forward. I know many times he was stuck between a rock and a hard place- me urging him to get more "in front of me" and him restricted by the wood and spring-steel parts of solid saddles. The horse feels like One Piece- not several that you manage to tape all together. Fix this, fix that, oh this again. I think the treeless lets it all flow freely!  ~Marcy Armstrong, Canada

Karen Rohlf, new Ansur Distributor in FL

Ovation, my 6 yr old Holsteiner/Paint

... started and ridden exclusively in the Ansur

... the only saddle he likes!

photo by www.danarasmussen.com

Ansur welcomes Karen Rohlf as our representative for the Ocala, Forida area.

Karen has trained over 20 years in dressage with Anne Gribbons ('O' dressage judge, International Grand Prix trainer and competitor) and studied Parelli Natural Horsemanship (‘old’ Level 3 Graduate) directly with Pat and Linda Parelli.

Not only has Karen trained students to upper level dressage, but she has represented the US four times on the Young Rider team, passed the "L" judging program with distinction and has been accepted into the USDF "r" judging program.

Karen gives clinics worldwide and when not traveling, trains and teaches at her Temenos Fields facility in Ocala.

Karen is the author of a book, DVD and a video series:

Dressage, Naturally: A guide to the basics of dressage from a natural perspective.

Results in Harmony Video Series

So all you native Floridians and visitors to Florida, give Karen a call and get a demo ride in an Ansur Saddle! Karen will also be representing Ansur's sister company, Northwestern Saddlery*, which produces the Westernaire for those who love western saddles and want treeless comfort for their horses and themselves.

Dressage, Naturally: Creating healthy biomechanics and stronger partnerships through combining principles of natural horsemanship with the art of dressage.

Karen's website is: http://www.dressagenaturally.net/

* Ansur and Northwestern Saddleries are in the same building under the watchful eye of CEO, Carole Weidner. Carole's office has a window looking into the shop in which the saddles are made for both companies.

Supplemental padding--do I need it?

First, evaluate the conformation and muscle development of your horse's back from all angles, looking for differences in his size and shape from side to side.

When you evaluate you horse from the rear (depending on how tall both of you are, you may need to stand on a stool or a bucket – (just be careful and don’t scare the bejeebers out of the horse and get yourself kicked into the next county) and look for any differences in the shape of his body. Some horses are more developed on one side than the other or have muscle atrophy from a previous saddle. If that's the case, then you may just need shims to fill in the gaps until the muscle grows back.

Now, ask yourself the questions below.

• Does he slope from the croup downwards towards the withers? Then you need to use a front wedge or riser pad to make the saddle sit level and keep the rider from tipping forward or struggling to sit up correctly in balance.


• Does he slope upwards from croup to withers? Does the rider struggle to not fall backwards in the saddle? The solution for this problem is a rear wedge or riser pad which will level the saddle and enable the rider to sit in balance.
  
• Is the horse a swayback? Then padding needs to be in the middle to fill in some of the sway and enable the rider to sit level. If he is table-top level...a regular saddle pad or even a thick bath towel will suffice.

Every horse is not the same shape or size all the time, so take a good look at your horse regularly to determine his/her needs.

We have found that the newer models of Ansür Saddles with the gullet ususally do not need additional padding. These pads are used mostly for Classics and older models of the Carlton and Konklusion.

Choosing a Saddle Pad for your Ansur Saddle

Saddle pads were not intended to protect the horse from the saddle. They were originally developed keep the horse’s sweat away from the leather. The sweat will change the properties of the leather, especially if not cleaned properly after each use, and weaken it over time.

And didn’t the travelers use their personal bedding, from skins to wool blankets, under the saddle? Well, yes, it’s a handy place to store them while traveling on horseback as well as the first benefit of protecting the saddle from the horse! That left more room to hang other necessary gear and food on the saddle…one less thing banging on the horse’s back. And better yet, if that bedding was extended beyond the saddle, it could cushion the horse’s back from the load of iron cooking pots and food supplies. Think about the evolution of the utilitarian sleeping skin stored under the saddle and becoming a “saddle pad” to the modern day vast array of pads to protect horses from the saddle.

Wouldn’t it make more sense to not to need to protect the horse from the saddle? To just protect the saddle from the horse’s sweat?

So how should one choose a saddle pad in modern times?

Do your homework and feel/squeeze/grope a lot of pads before spending big bucks on a pad that may have worked for another horse

No matter the brand...check the seams and binding, front, back and middle...if they feel hard, rough-edged and unforgiving, forget it, it will rub.

The squeeze test is: if your fingers are touching through the material...forget it, it's useless, it won’t soak up sweat. Remember the purpose of the pad is to protect the saddle leather from the horse’s sweat!