Ep. 54 Both boards on!

Hello, I'm Mary Wanlis WELcoming you to podcast 54. I hope you've done our big Boards exercise from last time. This is such an important exercise. I can't stress for you the value it can add to your clarity, your stability and your understanding. And if you've done it a few times, I hope you've really noticed what the pattern is in your body. So it can be as extreme as the person who I'm talking to in a lesson about her past and her history. And she goes, yeah, well, I've got this dodgy left knee from a fall I had and this funky left shoulder from a fall I had. And actually, I always seem to fall off that same way. Well, there could be a reason for that. And the other side of the coin is the only people I've ever met who've had groin strains were also very asymmetrical. And essentially the tendon that gave out was holding them on because they were falling off the other side. So the board on the same side as their damaged tendon was at least reasonably strong at the bottom, if not its whole length, and the other one was blobbing off to the side. And of course, that means you're going to fall off that way dead easily. And if the horse goes the other way, you've got an awful lot of adjustment for your body to do before you have to catch yourself. So there is a huge amount of mileage in both in a chair and in your riding on hacks. And in a basic warm up, just doing one side on, one side off, put one side on, put the other side off. Keep repeating that. Give yourself a naught to 10 scale for each board. So, so you can determine that one is on to an 8 and the other one is off to a 2. You want that off number to be really low. And when you reverse it, do you get to 100 or can you only do 7 3? Adding the numbers is really helpful. And when people have done that for a while, I'll get them to give me three numbers for each board. A number for the bottom area of the board in their pelvis, the middle area between their ribs and hips, and the upper area from above their bosom, over their bra strap and down to their shoulder blades in their back. And then with those three numbers, we can really know what are the weaker or the stronger places. Now, I came up with this exercise somewhere around 1995, so I've had more than 25 years of doing this, and I can still discover that one board has a wobbly Bit or a bit of a hole in it, and you can expect that, like bearing down.

This is a concept with a huge amount of mileage.

It's not a done deal for a very long time, if ever. And I would hope you expect to keep learning more as you keep doing it. There have been very few times in my life when I've been in a riding arena and I've run for it because a horse was coming at me so fast. But there have been the odd occasion, and one of them was somebody who arrived for a clinic with me. She did several clinics on a grand prix horse. Not a terribly well established and organized grand prix horse, but she kind of had piattre passage. Her presenting problem was that in piaf, the horse would disappear sideways, always to the right. Now, we had to work on her basics, first of all, because on the planes of up, down and back, front, there was a fair bit not working right. And then we found our way into the plane of side, side, and I did the boards exercise with her. And even just around me on a circle in walk. I said, okay, let's have you put your left board on and take your right board off. And the horse shot sideways towards me, and I ran for it. And she kind of rescued the situation, apologized and said, maybe I know what my problem is now. And that, of course, was her problem. She had a very strong left board that the horse would move away from. Remember our idea of using two boards to pick up autumn leaves in your garden? Because you only have one board, all you can do is chase the leaves across the barton. And she needed to find a right board with some strength and to back off with the left because it was getting her into serious trouble that she had such a big differential in the strength of both of them. Another interesting story involves a young guy who I taught quite a lot, also on a horse who was a very committed motorboat. I mean, this horse could do 0:60. It was very spooky, it was very hollow. And he got much better at riding it. But it meant that all our focus was taken up on the issues of back, front and up, down. And he then got bought a very much nicer horse and a more rideable horse, a horse with a load more potential. When he went off to college and was in training with a colleague of mine, and the first time I got to teach him there, things weren't going terribly well. He was having a hard time, you know, bedding in with this horse, as it were, and there were some significant left, right issues. And we did the boards exercise during a workshop, all sitting on chairs, really, because it was relevant to a couple of other riders in the clinic who were absolutely ready to do it. And he did the exercise alongside them. And at one point doing that, I caught his eye and he caught my eye. And I think we were both having the same thought. And he practiced overnight, got back on his horse the next day, and I think I really know what my problem is. And I went, yes, I think I really know what your problem is too. And he was able to come out and ride the fix. I talked him through it. We did the exercise. But essentially how, having been with me on a number of clinics and been through the process of learning how to learn and doing some of the other exercises that I do, he was able to pick that up and make a tremendous difference within that lesson and have a path to continue making those changes. So is your issue that one board is much stronger than the other? Can you get the strong side to let go as well as the weaker side to come on? Is your problem more around the bottom of the boards, the middles of the boards, or the tops of the boards? Is it on one side or both? Do you have the backs of the boards or the backs of the boards really wishy washy while you can focus on the front? When you do this exercise, always put the weaker one on first, getting it as clear as you can, and then the stronger one backing off, probably on how strong you make it. So as we said last time, you know some of the pushes and pulls on the pommel that can help you with the bottoms of the boards. And it's really good to have a way of firming up the tops of the boards as well. And the best way to do this is to have a strong elastic band that's maybe a foot long, maybe a bit less to have that band between your wrists. And it may be that this is an exercise band. You don't want really a wimpy elastic band. You want an exercise type 1. And if you can't find an exercise one that kind of size in America, there's a company called Griffit who do bands for holding books together that are really wide and they're very good for this. So you have to feel safe and secure enough on your horse to ride with that band between your wrists. And in a lesson, I might begin by putting my hands, the palms of my hands on the outsides of the rider's wrists and saying, push out against me. And as the rider pushes her wrists out against me, I'LL say to her, does anywhere in your body firm up? And if she says, well, no, I'll draw her attention to the top of her boards. From what we call the point in your pecs, which is a place you'd probably put your fingers straight there if you kind of went up from your bosom, between your bosom and your collarbone, there's a point there where a deep muscle inserts and it can get really sore. And if it does, it's really worth massaging it because there are lymph nodes under there, and that's the soreness. Is your body not dealing well with bacteria and toxicity and stuff like that? So you've got that point on your front over your shoulder straps to a similar kind of place behind that, just under your shoulder blade. And as your hands widen out against a resistance, you should feel those lines narrow in. Now, you need your car at a standstill to do this, but with your car at a standstill, you may be able to push out against the steering wheel to get a sense of. Of those boards up near the top narrowing in. And as they narrow in, they become stronger and clearer. And if you can get that at the top, it can make a world of difference to how your arms operate and how able you are to push your hands forward. On the weaker side. It might almost be as if your arm is falling out of your shoulder socket. Every now and again, I meet someone who's dislocated their shoulder in the past, and their body really is where that joint is very wobbly and not very stable. And it is as if their arm is falling out of their shoulder socket. And you may need to push your arm into your shoulder socket to get the weaker side to be stronger. And if you imagine that distance from the top of your board to the outside of your shoulder joint, and this would be like the epaulettes on a military or a doorman's uniform. You think of that on each side. It could be really good to be on your horse and go, okay, I've got the epaulette. And if I think about the horse's long back muscle under the panel of the saddle, and I think about my epaulette, is my epaulette lined up over the horse's long back muscle, or is it off to the side? And is the epaulette on the other side lined up over the horse's long back muscle, or is it off to the side? Sometimes one side stays really clearly in place, but the other one drifts outwards. And sometimes the most iffy Side drags the other side out of place with it. So can you line your epaulettes up over the horse's long back muscles? And it might help you to think of his long back muscles under the panels of the saddle and extending back behind you to towards his croup, where they attach into the nearest part of his pelvis. This adds a huge amount of stability in your arms and in your ability to keep your midline over your mane, because your epaulettes are lined up over the horse's long back muscles. And as well as that, when you've organized the bottom of you and you've organized the top of you, you have way much greater chance of organizing the middle of you. So if you collapse on one side and you get creases around your waist, your epaulettes will not be lined up. And if you can line up your epaulettes, you've then got much more chance of dealing with those creases. And we've done the exercise of putting your fist on your side, pushing your fist against your side push, pushing your side against your fist, and adding to that push by putting your tongue against the gum line of your upper molars on the same side. You can probably make that correction be much more effective now and maybe think of, from your sternum or your belly button, a line going diagonally inside you to your pelvis, and a line going diagonally inside you to your armpit. Can you elongate those lines to help you not collapse on that side and get your epaulettes lined up? You have more chance of being able to fill out your soggy side when you have both boards on, you've lined up your epaulettes, and you're really aware of how much firmness and stuffing you have to put into that soggy side. And the stretch we did a few podcasts ago, using a stable door is incredibly important. And I really encourage you to keep doing that stretch. And if you do that stretch well, you should come out of it with your body feeling expanded on, that caved inside. And if you can keep that as you then move around through your day and find a place at home where you can do that stretch so you can do it several times a day, it really could help you make a difference. The story of finding this goes back to the mid-90s, and it became incredibly confusing because what would happen is I'd be riding my horse one day and I'd get myself what was for me at that time, a really good feeling. And I'd be thinking, yeah, I feel really narrow. It's a narrow feeling. That's how I have to be. And a few days later, I'd have a good ride and I'd be thinking, okay, so what am I doing here? And I'd be thinking, I feel wide, I feel wider. It's a wide feeling. But the other day I had a narrow feeling, but now I've got a wide feeling. And this would keep happening, you know, one day I'd be going, got this good feeling, it's about being narrow. And maybe the following week I'd be going, got this good feeling, it's about being wide. And I sat there scratching my head, thinking, I'll understand this one day. And remember, having done a degree in physics, I had a professional training on wrestling with paradox and not letting paradox freak you out. So this kept happening. And then there was the day, I think I might have told you about, where I got in my car and thought, sitting really funny. This was straight after a ride. And then I began to figure it out that it was my seat bones that were much closer together with more flesh to the outside of my seat bones, down on the seat of the chair and in my horse, I'd actually been feeling narrow between my seat bones, but wider in both of the outer thirds. And the dominant feeling of which of those I really focused in on and was amplifying and using to help me in my riding varied from ride to ride until I realized that I was both narrow and wide at the same time. And I called this the narrow wide paradox. And in the narrow wide paradox, you're narrow between your seat bones, you're narrow in that middle third that we want to get down to windpipe width, the width of both your windpipe and your vertebra. And I was wide in my right third and my left third, learning how to get more stuffing in them, learning how to get them across the horse's long back muscles. And that paradox is really important, and we've alluded to it before when we've done exercises of getting your seat bones to be wider apart and tucking in the flesh from the side of your butt to. To get your seat bones to be closer together. So we have done that kind of exercise before, and now you're realising that there's more to it than just seat bones and underneaths. But what I want to do here now is to see if I can simply explain a bit of anatomy so you've got a clearer understanding of how this works. And I want you to put one arm out in front of you so Your upper arm is horizontal or a bit lower than horizontal, and your lower arm is vertical. And we're going to pretend that your elbow is like your knee and your arm going up to your wrist is like your thigh. And your knees are narrower than your pelvis. So put that part of your arm so it's angled slightly outwards and turn your hand so the back of your hand is close to horizontal. So now we're modelling from your knee up your thigh bone to your wrist. And the outside of your wrist would be like the bony knobble that we've felt so many times on the outside of your panty line at the top outside of your thigh, the greater trochanter of the femur. Now curl your fingers so almost in a holding the reins type position, so your fingertips are somewhere near the middle of your palm. So now we're modelling your thigh going upwards and outwards to the trochanter and your thigh bone turning in and where your fingers are curled, that would be like the head of the femur, the round part that goes into the hip socket. So let's take your other hand and make a hip socket by making a shape with your palm that you can fit your knuckles into. So now we have your thigh going outwards. The greater trochanter is the nobble, the thigh turning in to the head of the femur, which is rounder than you can make your curled fingers going into the hip socket. And your wrist would be down underneath that hip socket. That's pretty much where your seat bone.

And the sled runner are.

So we now have this little horizontal bit of thigh after your thigh's gone round the corner, and that's called the neck of the femur. And when older ladies who have osteoporosis fall and break their thigh, that tends to be what they break. But realize how convenient this shape is. We've come up around the horse's barrel to the trochanter, turn the corner to the neck of the femur into the hip socket, and we have the seat bone as your wrist of the second hand and the inside of your wrist of your first hand, with a little bit of a distance between them, like the horse's long back muscle. And we can't model this, but your thigh has an under nobble to go with the big nobble on the outside of the trochanter, called the lesser trochanter, which would be by the creases of your first wrist. And between your seat bone and your lesser trochanter is this distance in your thigh set up to be able to go across the horse's long back muscle before your thigh goes around that corner by the trochanter and the rest of your thigh is going down and around the horse's ribcage. Now, I hope I was able to explain that well enough for, for you.

To get the idea.

And then next time round, we're going to do an exercise to really help you feel this in your thigh so you can get a lived understanding of that anatomy in your body. But meanwhile, keep playing with the boards. Exercise, go one side on, one side off, one side on, one side off. Give yourself numbers when you put both sides on. Think of the idea of two people fighting to sit on the same bar still, but neither one must push the other one off. Or think of the two boards picking up autumn leaves in your garden. And while you're doing this, I hope you can do it in a sense of play and exploration, discovery, and I hope your horse is sane and sensible enough that you can try this and not be so caught up on the water ski motorboat issues like the young lad I told you about that you can't get to this stage. But wherever you're at in your practice, have fun riding, enjoy your horses and.

I'll be back again soon. These podcasts are linked to two other Internet sites. One is dressagetraining tv, which hosts a whole variety of webinars taught by myself, Mary Wanlis and my colleague Ali Wakelin, where we're working live with a variety of horses and riders, showing them the basics of biomechanics and helping them build their skill and train their horses, and explaining to the audience as we do this. There's also a groundwork certification course on that site based on the work of Dr. Andrew MacLean and Equine Learning Theory. And this too gives you a step by step guide to building your skills. We'd also love you to take a look at Just Giving and then to search Overdale to find the Just Giving page for Overdale Equestrian Centre, which is my UK home base here in this time of lockdown in 2020, we have 10 school horses eating, of course, and.

Pooping and doing all the things that.

Horses do and no income to support those horses. And whilst they're having a wonderful time for us, this is something of a stress and if you've enjoyed these webinars or enjoyed these podcasts and benefited from them and you're willing to give any small or large amount to our Just Giving page, we would be so grateful. Many thanks. To you.