A member of the Nokota drill team riding bridleless and bareback at the 2011 MN Horse Expo
Whoosh! A drill team of Nokotas ridden by young ladies more than half my age (and weight) explode into the coverall. Staying out of their way would be difficult, so I ask the fearless leader, “Do you mind if I join your drill practice?” Muffled snickers were heard by sight. “Sure,” the leader smiles.
Dressed in my formal English suit, Makana’s white braids swung with ever nod as we tagged along in the drill patterns. Then ladies formed a circle with the horses’ facing in. “Come on, we’re not done yet,” they grinned and motioned for me to join them.
“Okay, I’ll be a good sport,” I said and rode Makana into the circle. Suddenly the girls stood up on the backs of their Nokotas, slid off their horses’ back ends, and ran and hopped back into their saddles. Then they swung a leg over to one side and flip backwards off their saddles.
“Umm, I didn’t sign up for this!” I said. Now I know what the muffled snickers meant.
I rode out of the coverall to the exercise area outside of the Coliseum and worked with Makana over a wooden bridge that had been set up there. Uncertainty gripped her. We faced the object until she relaxed. Then she took a couple steps onto the bridge and backed off. Ten minutes later Makana and I were on the bridge when the drill team blasted past. They applauded our efforts at demonstrating some sort of trick.
You see, if you knew me 30 years ago, I was young and thin like them. I was a fearless trail guide for Diamond T Ranch in Eagan, MN. It was a dream job: ride for free and get paid for it too! One of the differences between the paying riders and the trail guides were that the latter rode the horses right off the auction truck and bareback for lack of saddles.
My most heroic ride was when I took a group out for a sunset trail ride. A half hour away from the club house, the wind picked up and swirled through the hardwood forest. Sounds of distant thunder grew near, and fireflies and lightning lit our way. Soon the skies opened up rain came down in sheets. Riding bareback on a wet horse seemed more like riding a greased pig. Thankfully, we all lived to tell about it.
Twenty-five years ago my fearlessness came to an end when I lost control. That’s when anxiety took over my equestrian life, and fear imprisoned me for many years. Back then I was talked into buying a four-year-old thoroughbred off the track. Riding trail horses and retraining a race horse are two different things. Green rider, green horse didn’t end well. I fell off more times than I kept count and asked my instructor, “Will you teach me how to fall off without getting hurt?”
Eventually panic attacks and hyperventilation gripped me each time I felt a horse react. I had rare moments of success when riding indoors at a walk, on a 15-meter circle, traveling left, on a calm day, with no distractions (not something experienced much in Minnesota). I faced a cross-road: It was time to give up riding or face my fear. Thankfully my passion for horses won out.
So for me it feels like victory to be riding at the MN Horse Expo, State Fair, and trailering to state parks to trail ride in circumstances far beyond my control. Fear hasn’t disappeared, but it has been managed by perseverance, good instruction, wise counsel, faith in a power greater than myself, and finding a suitable mount.
So, will you see me standing on my saddle, flipping of the side, and riding bridleless and bareback? Umm, well, maybe next year.
- Gift of Freedom ridden and owned by Jennifer Klitzke was one of the three demonstration TWH horse/rider teams at the 2011 MN Horse Expo
Naturally Gaited Horse 