Isn’t it frustrating when life, the weather, missing shoes or lameness get in the way of you regularly practicing that riding issue you’ve been determined to crack.

 

A while ago I read a book called ‘The Talent Code” by Daniel Coyle. In it he talks about how people gain the skills to perform activities such as kick a ball or play an instrument. It is all down to something called Myelin. In simple terms Myelin is the fibres that attach to our nerves to make them send the messages to the muscles to make them do what we are asking. So in order to kick a ball like a premiership footballer you would need to repeatedly kick the ball with the aim being to gain the same power and accuracy in order to build up the necessary myelin fibres to be able to do it.

 

Now I can hear you thinking “well that’s the point, I was practicing every day and then I had to go away for work, or my horse lost a shoe….” well here comes a little life hack-Myelin doesn’t actually know if you are on your horse or not, it just knows what muscles you are trying to move where.

 

So inspired by my friend who is a regular at life hacking riding practice into driving the car and work meetings-(or she might just have worms) here are some things to think about that you can do whilst doing other every day activities.

 

Whilst driving the car or sat in a meeting

• Can you feel both your seat bones equally?
• Is your front and back equal length?
• Are you equal left to right?
• Are your upper shoulders relaxed?
• Can you feel a slight retraction of your shoulder blades supporting your arms as they hold the wheel?

These are all postural requirements of riding that you can train your body to do when you are not on a horse, then when you are back on board it will be second nature!

 

Give it a go this week and see if you can feel the difference when you ride from all that extra practice!