Fighting for Your Health

The older one gets the harder it is to make time to ride hard and to care for one's self nutritionally. Little aches and pains don't go away as quickly as they once did.

But, resilience can come with age. And health benefits come with pushing yourself. For the past several years I have been putting more time into soil and water conservation and teaching and less time in the saddle. The result was that I was becoming a poor rider and riding was becoming very uncomfortable to me. In fact, it was causing enough pain so that I considered the possibility that age had caught up to me. (In six months I will be sixty.)

I feared that I was at the point that many riders slow down (give up) and settle into a life of surrendering to arthritis and obesity.

In June I jumped back into riding longer distances at a trot and canter. I put a lot of time on a particular mare, Janie, primarily of Grand Canyon and Choctaw lineage. Morning rides before work, several after work rides during the week and heavier mileage on the weekends are turning her into the super horse that I know that she can be.

Heavy mileage and a ketogenic based diet have done wonders for my mind and my body. Heavy miles, carrying a heavy rider, while eating a lot of vegetable oil has transformed Janie too. She has put on 85 pounds of muscle since we began to ride hard.

Don't give in just because riding makes you sore. Check with your Dr. first. I hope that you have a Dr. who understands riding and just what a horse can do for a person's metal state. If the Dr. gives the go ahead set a big goal. Keep records. Achieve your goal. Ride when it is hot. Ride when it is cold. Ride when it is raining. Ride when it is dry. Ride in the morning. Ride at dusk.

Everything changes when you ride hard enough.

Everything.