Pegasus Podcast
@thepegasusapp https://www.thepegasus.app/🐴 Conversations with the movers and shakers of the global equestrian industry. Hosted by Pegasus founders Sam Baynes and Jen Tankel.
Pegasus Podcast
Built to Fit: The Schleese Saddlery Story
The truth about saddle fitting will transform how you think about equestrian equipment forever. Master saddle maker Jochen Schleese pulls back the curtain on centuries of tradition to reveal shocking facts about how conventional saddles damage both horses and riders.
A defining moment came when Schleese's own competitive horse was eliminated from team selection due to mysterious, intermittent lameness. Years later, he witnessed groundbreaking research showing how traditional saddle designs slowly destroy shoulder cartilage – the exact issue that ended his horse's career. This revelation became his life's mission: to revolutionize saddle design using scientific principles rather than outdated traditions.
The conversation takes a fascinating turn when Schleese explains how a gynecologist's anatomical insights transformed saddle design for female riders. Despite women comprising the vast majority of equestrians worldwide, most saddles are still built around male pelvic structures, causing discomfort and potential health issues for women. Through pelvis casts and biomechanical studies, Schleese pioneered gender-specific designs that accommodate fundamental differences in human anatomy.
You'll discover why "follow the money" explains the prevalence of poorly fitted saddles, how to identify ethical versus unethical saddle fitters, and practical tips for finding equipment that serves both you and your horse. Whether you're a competitive rider or weekend enthusiast, this episode provides crucial knowledge to protect your horse's welfare and enhance your riding experience.
Head to https://schleese.com/ to learn more about scientifically-designed saddles that prioritize both horse anatomy and rider comfort.
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Speaker 2:So why follow the money? Because as long as the saddle doesn't fit, you increase your care in terms of body worker lameness. You blame it on the shoeing, you blame it on the trainer and you spend, spend, spend, spend, spend. It says enough Enough. With this unethical saddle fitting, we got to do justice to these horses and we got to give every horse lover, horse owner who has a hard horse, a horse in the heart and loves their horses and wants to save some money, some clear, scientific, logical answers.
Speaker 1:Jokic, great to have you on the podcast and I said it correctly this time.
Speaker 2:Yes, Jen, you did. Thank you very much for having me Of course, all right.
Speaker 1:Well, I want to get started with you know who you are, about your company, the founding story jumping right in.
Speaker 2:Yes, I'm a horse crazy guy, so for me everything is about horses. And it started off at a very, very early childhood when I was born in Germany. But at the age of six months my parents moved to Buenos Aires. My other two brothers were born there and my first eight years I lived in Buenos Aires and my dad taught German schools all around the world. So that stanch was eight years in Buenos Aires, in Argentina, and I remember this like yesterday.
Speaker 2:We were little kids sitting in the back of the car and all of a sudden, out of nowhere, this massive bird was passing this car. It was an emu. We were in the gridlock, the cars didn't go anywhere. We were in the gridlock Surprise, didn't go anywhere. We were in the big traffic jam and that wasn't a big surprise. There's this gaucho, a cowboy, running behind this emu, and I look out of the window and see what's going on and I see this cowboy no, reins, reins just hanging there and he has these strings and he's swinging them over his head and attached on the end are these stones and he catches the emu by throwing this rope around the legs and he catches this wild emu. And I just looked at Daddy and I said, daddy, I think I saw a centaur. So I was mesmerized with this human who rode this wild horse.
Speaker 2:And all I wanted to do when I was this little kid wanted to be on a horse. I wanted to be one of those, and on a teacher's salary, living in a different country, that was out of the question. I was always around barns and horses. But finally mom had enough with traveling around the world. We all moved back to Germany and I was very, very lucky because I nagged my parents enough that finally we had horses. And I also was very, very lucky that my neighbor was a very good horseman, so he helped us with finding the right horses, teaching us, and before we knew, we had seven horses, first ponies and then horses. And then I ended up riding on the German team as a 3D event rider in the junior program.
Speaker 2:Not to impress you, just to tell you that my saddlery trait was not even in the picture at that stage. All I wanted to do was something with horses. And when I taught a lot and I thought this is what I do, I just play all day in the barn, but my dad, who taught physics and math, is no, no, no, you, you need. You need a trade at least, or you go to university. Fine, I become a doctor. I wanted to learn something about anatomy and physiology and bones. Oh, I love all that stuff.
Speaker 2:But you know, I spent too much time in the barn. My grade wasn't so good, so I had to go to night school to catch up on my level of grades and dad says no, no, no, no, Do something in the meantime. So through fluke I stumbled onto saddlery and I thought it's kind of cool, I can fix more stuff, because every time I give my saddle away it takes forever to get. So I started to become an apprentice saddle maker and I remember this like this yesterday my dad always taught us always ask why Kids remember, because the person who knows the how will always follow the person who knows the why. So of course, here's this little jocky guy and he goes to the apprenticeship. And why do we need to make a saddle like this? And this master was saying to me man, you ask a lot of questions.
Speaker 2:We do it like this because I say so. We're doing it for hundreds and thousands of years. Just be quiet and do it Fine. Back to my venture I went. So when I started my apprenticeship I kept riding and I remember this like yesterday.
Speaker 2:Our long goal was the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics and I had some really good horses, and one in particular, and I was sponsored in saddles and finally I made it to the top and I got the saddle. What everybody else got, I got the jacket, I got the cap and I was so proud to ride in the saddle. But you know what Jen, growing up on horses, bareback riding, did gymnastic on horses. We call it vaulting it. It's pretty big in Germany, not so much here in North America. So I really was in tune with the horse.
Speaker 2:But you think I could put two and two together that this new sponsored saddle that everybody had was actually bad for my horse. I didn't want to listen to that. I ignored it. So here I go riding in this cool saddle like everybody has, but my horse decreased to the fact where the team coach said I don't know if I take you to the European Championship if you don't figure this out, because once in a while middle in my dressage test you hear the bell. Ding ding, ding ding. He says I didn't go. Of course, why is the judge ringing the bell? So I had to trot up several times again because the horse was intermittently lame. Here we go in my dressage saddle, not my venting saddle or jumping saddle in my dressage saddle, so the other saddle I never changed because I really felt good, I had a good balance. I'm a pretty tall guy, so for a rider I'm very tall.
Speaker 1:How tall are you?
Speaker 2:I'm six foot three. Okay, Then I was a stick like 175 pounds. Now I weigh 205 pounds. Pure muscle pure muscle and so anyway, so fast forward. Um, we did finally get off the team because my horse had this on and off lameness nobody could figure out back then what year was that?
Speaker 1:and were you still in germany at this time, or was this? When you have come back?
Speaker 2:that was the late 70s, sorry, the late, yeah, 79, 80s, 1980. And well, my horse retired and I got more and more involved into catching up with the grades and into my salary. I really liked saddles. And there was another connecting dots I couldn't put together. See my family. We all started to ride my brothers, my sister but somehow my sister always added up with really cool horses and we were all happy that she quit riding because it was too uncomfortable for her and we got the good horses.
Speaker 2:So, making a long story short, I started to ask while I was going through my apprenticeship, I finished my journeyman yeah, my apprenticeship, and went into a journeyman and then I applied for the master's school. So first you go three years to apprentice, then you have to show you have significant amount of time three to five years to be a journeyman and then you can apply to the master school. Through all this time my horse was already retired, the one I was pulled from the team. All this time I always wondered what was this that is in this particular saddle horse was laying, who was just sitting here? But there was a second factor, when my sister came in and she says you know it hurts, I don't want to ride in it. So I asked my master why do we make the saddle so pointy in the crotch, remember.
Speaker 2:My dad told us, always ask why. And he says, well, because we I say so, we always done it. Plus, the horse has a high, high withers and when you sit bareback on the horse your seat bone goes into the soft muscle tissue and then the bone what forms the withers in the spine of the horse. The spinal processes of for horse act like a part divider. So for a guy we cannot fall on our parts, otherwise we faint and fall over Right. So when you ride bareback as a guy, nature from the pointy withers or from the higher spine horses puts your part left or right. A guy has never a problem or doesn't faint because you're not sitting on it. So in saddlery we build this extra peak. We call it the crotch peak because it's in the crotch and it peaks up in the saddle.
Speaker 1:At that point, too, that had not really been discussed. So it was just. This is what we've always done. There was no such thing as innovation or adapting the saddle to fit your anatomy. This is just it. So this was the first time that questions had been asked.
Speaker 2:That's right. And Jen, listen to this. All my students 90% were women and I asked my mom. I says why are these girls always complain so much? The one guy I teach never complained so much, always makes excuses about the saddle. Oh, my underwear rubs around here. I asked the lady to get off. I had underwear on. I did all kinds of exercises. She says there's no way you can feel the seam of the underwear. See, I already knew we put that peak in the saddle to help the male rider with their male parts, but I didn't connect the dots at this point. Another years went by and I went with my wife, immigrated to Canada in 1986 to become the official saddler for the first Torsage World Championship in North America.
Speaker 1:Oh, no kidding.
Speaker 2:So we were very fortunate to have great sponsors and great people who helped us to give us a leg up, and I remember in very short time we made the entire silence for the Canadian team and the US team back in the late 80s. And I remember this girl she's still alive says you have to speak to my gynecologist. And I just looked at her with big eyes and says are you joking? Why would I need to speak to your gynecologist? Well, you know, he says I really should stop riding or get a better saddle. And he explained me why and why don't you listen directly to him? Don't take it the wrong way, ashley. I don't want to go to a girl's doctor. What am I going to do? So, anyway, it turns out, three weeks later he showed up in my little salary. You know what he brought? He brought these little things. Let me see if I have them.
Speaker 1:He brought his tools. You've got your tools.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So he says let me show you something. This is a male pelvis, a male pelvis and a female pelvis. You can always recognize, as a matter of fact, when people are buried and they dig that person up, you see still the skeleton based on the pelvis. That's the way you can identify if the person was a boy or a girl. So okay, so he shows me what's so specific. On the male pelvis we have a longer tailbone, narrow seat bone. These things cause the pubic branches. It's a very thin bone, pubic symphysis, right. So this is the vertebrabrae and between the vertebrae a disc and each vertebrae are stacked on to form a spine with four curves. Okay, still was very bored at that time says what does this guy do in my shop?
Speaker 1:but and this was the gynecologist. Is that right?
Speaker 2:yeah, that's the gynecologist from the canadian member who says I got to talk to one of these guys. So he says well, when we ride because I ride too, the gynecologist says it my wife rides. When I can ride, I can do all kinds of exercise on the horse and pivot my pelvis. But here is the difference, massive difference with women pelvises. But here is the difference, massive difference with women pelvises. They have way more lordosis, more curvature in the lower back than the male, which pivots the pelvis different. This is always flat. For the disc to sit flat and not flip. The pelvis axis is more in this forward section and the pubic branches are flat. This is where the underwear line runs through. And I go oh, that's what the girl was trying to teach me when I was teaching her 10 years ago in Germany. Oh, I get it. That's why I couldn't feel it. But they can. And he carried on. He says girls has a shorter tailbone, wider seat bone, so the baby's head can go through here. Well, I know that. But I did not know when he says no matter what underwear my wife is using, how padded it is, she will get always irritation in her seat when riding, no matter what saddle. We tried. As a matter of fact, common problem for my patient chronic not occasionally chronic bladder and kidney on the rise in female riders.
Speaker 2:I says, come on from horseback riding. He says tell me how you make a saddle. So here I go, very happy to tell them about. Oh, I asked my master saddler. We build the peak in the crotch so it divides the parts on the male and we guys are happy to ride.
Speaker 2:And then he looked at me and says well, every time I go into a tack shop I barely see any clothes for guys, mainly for women. And if I go to the barn the majority of the rider in our barn are women. Why does the saddle industry don't make a saddle for the women pelvis? And I went uh, I don't know, works fine with me when we as a saddle maker make a saddle. We sit in the saddle, we move around, oh, that feels comfortable and we carry on. But I never felt what my sister felt or my poor students, ladies, felt. So he says you got to take butt cast. I says I'm sorry, what you know? My friend is a dentist. He does dental implants and he takes an imprint. So with him together we formed this saddle out of a very soft foam with vinyl on top which stretches four ways and to this day we have still our little room, what we call our butt museum.
Speaker 1:That is so cool.
Speaker 2:And over 115 seat casts we have made since 1986, 88. So what you see when you go in this room you see two shapes One is like a V, one is like a V, one is like that and what puts that imprint in the seat, in the cast so far down, is the low pubic symphysis, what the lady has compared to the high pubic symphysis. See, this is level here to the guy. So he says you got to take that peak out. And that's when we sold our patent to the bicycle company when we made, based on the cast from the over 100 different cast, the standard male saddle with this peak in. Here you can see this is the highest point, narrow seat bone for guys and a high rise in the front. That that feels like riding Babic on the horse.
Speaker 1:Perfect First principles. Yeah, you've got to get your customer to try the saddle that you're designing them for A hundred percent.
Speaker 2:And then he says you know, the neck of the femur is different, the muscles on the femurs are different, the lower back on the femur is different, the tailbone is different. So all of a sudden we created a seat wider for the seat point for the ladies, narrow for the inner thighs, but the main part. You see, here there's a hole. Okay, so now you don't have to sit on a rooftop anymore as a female rider no more, because we can put our tidy whities on and put our male parts left or right. Girls have her parts inside. So when we sold this to the bicycle company in the mid-90s that patent we also noticed that the guys absolutely hated riding in a female saddle. You know why? Because their parts didn't get divided. They were now underneath them.
Speaker 1:It's the same problem, but for the opposite.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. Parts didn't get divided. They were now underneath them. It's the same problem, but for the opposite. Absolutely for the first time. When I made the saddle, I made five saddles for my wife and I thought I married the wrong woman because she was always complaining about the saddles doesn't she appreciate my skill and craftsmanship to this leather?
Speaker 2:I said I got the wrong girl Anyway. So she was so happy with the saddle after we did this to the anatomy of her pelvis. And then I said, fine, I'm too lazy to change the saddles, I keep riding your horse now with your saddle. I said, oh my God, these poor ladies. What have they done all these years? Now here comes the fun part. What have they done all these years? Now here comes the fun part. The fun part is that many people say, well, if the ladies are so disadvantaged, how come they're the Olympians? How come they're still on a ride? We're tougher. You don't know what you don't know Like.
Speaker 2:Ask one guy to ride in a female breeches or female jeans or female clothes. There's no way you find a single guy riding with a female underwear or female jeans because it doesn't fit one of the nine important seat compartments. So if I now fast forward and answer the question to the people who say, well, how come this person is so successful? In writing. The gynecologist said to me you will always find a way to walk in the shoe. What gives you a blood blister? You're going to alter your walk. You're going to pronate or roll out your foot if the blacklist is on your pinky or on a big toe, you will always walk. People will always ride because it's part of it. So then, what really encouraged me after I spoke to him are medical doctors. This is a neurosurgeon, right? So Dr James Worson wrote a book.
Speaker 1:And who is this?
Speaker 2:That's Dr James Worson.
Speaker 1:Is he the one? Is this the gynecologist?
Speaker 2:No, this is another writer in North America, from Virginia, who wrote the book. And then there's another book written by a veterinarian which I want to talk next about saddle fitting. Book written by a veterinarian which I want to talk next about saddle fitting. So now I had something what always piqued my interest the science, the medical side. I have not only a medical doctor tells me about the three long-term damage a rider will get permanent knee and hip problems, one we already mentioned what the gynecologist said chronic bladder and kidney infection and three L4, l5 disc issue. Many, many female riders who ride for a living have surgery. I don't know, I'm not following that kind of stats, but who am I to ask these doctors or question them? And then something really neat happened, unfortunately, almost 16 years after my horse was eliminated in Holland. They put a horse on the treadmill underneath their saddle. They injected a camera, fiber optic underneath the front side.
Speaker 1:And when is this? This was while you were in Germany competing.
Speaker 2:No, no, this was when I went back in 1996. Okay, University in Utrecht, that's in Holland. So I watched them do this research. This horse walked right on the treadmill and on top is a rider secured with harness the top in case a horse missteps. The whole demonstration was just like whoa, you're just watching an action movie here. Any minute something happens nasty. It didn't Nothing happened nasty, but what I saw is how the shoulder blade did not slide parallel to the triangle and the metal-reinforced gullet plate, what all saddles have clipped away, slowly but surely, the cartilage of the shoulder.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:And that was my horse. I, as a I think I was already a journeyman at that stage crippled my own horse with the saddle. I was sponsored and I trusted the saddle fitter that I get a saddle that fits my horse. Well, remember, if you go back, all I cared is was to have the jacket and the head, and I was was in the cool club.
Speaker 1:Well, and people weren't asking the questions. Then they just said this is how it's always been created.
Speaker 2:And here's I don't want to use this as an excuse, but I just met three years ago here in Florida, ocala. This gentleman comes quite often over from Denmark. He's a professor in Copenhagen University in Denmark. Professor in Copenhagen University in Denmark. He said when I went to a veterinarian school in 1978, we, as veterinarians, were made to believe horses don't have pain receptors. What Right? So now they're writing papers on the pain scale of the horse. Veterinarians have come up with an ethogram which you can tell when the horse wrinkles over the eyes, over the nose, what means while you're riding. So we have a pain scale. And here's another fun part AI has developed already an app where you can not only measure the entire horse's fat, you can also measure the horse's face for the pain analysis.
Speaker 1:Oh, interesting. What is that app called?
Speaker 2:If you Google it, it will come up. It's pretty cool. I just wanted to mention that because we know that the industry, the technology, goes so fast these days. Right, and here we go. I just took the picture to show you. Oh, wow, you know. So it's really cool. You can also now, uh, get all these measurements done by your phone. That's all for free. So, no matter where you live in the world, you can get your phone out, download the horse I happen to know what that calls horse shape shape app, horse shape app Like a horse and then shape Gotcha, and it's for free.
Speaker 2:And I called this guy and says Andreas, how can you make it for free? Well, I want customer to see what the horse's back looks like. If a professional makes money on it stuffing a saddle, selling a saddle, fitting a saddle they make money on it. So they, if they want the measurement, pay the price. This is what a great business model. Because what does a customer really care? What their number is from here to here? They want to see the shape. So if I'm a horse owner, I want to see if my horse is bigger than the shoulder. I can see it in picture. I can see if somebody sits like this or like this and big shoulders and the chest out is it kind of cool right?
Speaker 1:you must be probably the only saddle company that was created with the expertise of a gynecologist influencing the design I can't imagine there are other saddle makers out there that have had that guidance from a gynecologist, but but, but all that said because, to your point, back in the day, people didn't ask the right questions. They had what they had. They realized once the damage was done with their saddle had unfortunately done to the horse and even to themselves. So you were able to have the expertise, have the outside influence to change that narrative and then influence your designs. Would you say that others have also had that level of, or maybe that epiphany of, wow, we really need to start thinking about the anatomy. Or would you say that you're unique in that type of way of thinking about saddle making?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So there are approximately over 365 saddle companies worldwide, 65 well-known. It's pretty hard for me to say who's better, who's not, but I like to say that I would never, as a trainer, rider, saddle maker would have changed if the customer wouldn't have demanded. Because in my world everything was great and I always pinpoint and blame the girls. Why do they not try a little harder? Because I didn't understand. See, like you mentioned it so eloquently. You said you know, it was shaped by this gynecologist who was curious because his patients says my love is riding. I'm competing on the Canadian team, right, you can't tell me I have to stop riding. Well, then he says get a better saddle. That's how it snowballed. And remember I was telling you the story about when I was in Holland and I watched that horse under the treadmill and seeing how the saddle crippled, got crippled from the saddle, I cried like a baby, so I ran out. I was 34 years at this stage and I called my daddy immediately and I said Daddy, I know what my calling is. I want to teach this worldwide. So no horse owner ever has to lose their best horse. If it's a hard horse, this is their best friend. If it's their Olympic horse doesn't matter. Nobody ever should do something to the horse unintentionally.
Speaker 2:What is the end of the horse? So why is it the end of the horse when you cut your ear off or your nose? Cartilage does not regrow. So when you have a saddle, what doesn't fit in the tree width? Every salah has a d-ring on the left and on the right. So measure the distance of the d-ring. That's how you know on the left and on the right. So measure the distance of the D-ring. That's how you know how the tree width is.
Speaker 2:Let me see if I find a saddle here. Okay. So if you look at the saddle tree, you see the corners here. Okay. So watch if my fingernail would be the D-ring. See, it can be that way or that way. So that's the width Right On the western saddle. They call it the bar width. They used to call it quarter horse, semi-quarter horse, arrow fit. Now they go anywhere from four to nine inches. Okay, the distance from index finger to index and then down here. That is the angle. Okay.
Speaker 2:So if I visualize a barn door and a barn building and I have this big door, what slides close to close the barn door. But if the barn door is out of the hinge or doesn't align up with the wall of the building, the barn door doesn't close. Of course I can have an opinion, like we all have, especially when it comes to satellite. We all have opinions and in my opinion, that barn door will close. Let's get the front end load on my tractor and let's push that barn door close and it will close, but not until you break the wall or the door. So with horses, saddles and I don't care if you're talking about $100 saddles or $15,000 saddles in France, I don't care what money. Money is irrelevant in this moment. Of course money is relevant, but let's talk about what the horse feels.
Speaker 2:This is an angle we just talked about and the horse's scapula in their body Remember I said I'm kind of a freak when it comes to anatomy and biomechanics when I bent my elbow that joint just goes back and forth. This action comes out of the shoulder. This action comes out of the shoulders. This joint can go only back and forth. So, the same as humans, horses have shoulder joints and hip joints and the joint that rotates in many different areas have kind of like a round, looks like a frying pan upside down here and then in there goes a ball and that's the upper arm. So the scapula has the rotation this way. But when that leg goes forward it pushes the scapula in a circular motion upwards and backwards.
Speaker 2:I always encourage people if you're brave enough and you have a friend and you have a horse which you trust, please sit on him bareback, close your eyes and put your hands on the biggest part of the shoulder. Look up and ask a friend just to walk straight ahead and what you feel is incredible. You feel like a piston. The shoulders go up and down and upwards, backwards. So obviously this angle here of the shoulder is important. This bone, what sticks up, is called the spine of the shoulder. On top here is cartilage. Why is there cartilage? Because it's sandwiched between two muscle groups where the shoulder goes through. If this cartilage is damaged or gets hurt, it's exactly the same what happens to the muscles, like you would take your steak and you rub it over a cheese grater.
Speaker 1:Right, just slowly takes it away.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you can't grow it back, yeah, so the horse will not go forward. So this is. I got this from a veterinarian in Johannesburg. She was traveling and working in the UK, united Emirates, in North America, very well-known surgeon, dr Catalina Pearson, and she brought all these skeletons and he says you can totally tell which horse it was A dresser, a jumper, an endurance horse or a driving horse?
Speaker 1:Interesting Is that because of the saddle that the rider was choosing to use and therefore how it was affecting the horse's ligaments and cartilage and everything like that- yeah, and she showed me.
Speaker 2:It's like CSI saddle fit. I said, oh, but the bones tell a story. If you take a ball pen hammer and you hit your chin really hard not too hard, you don't want to break it, but hard enough that you will limp for four or five days the bone will create a new bone on top. Bone grows bone when it's under attack. So this here is not normal. See that little blob here, is that?
Speaker 1:technically a bone spur. Is that what you would classify that as?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it could be. Some people call it bone spur. So this is when the tree is not narrow enough. This is kind of the barn wall, this is the barn door. Okay, if the tree is not right, wide enough, it keeps hitting. Okay, so let's compare a helmet with a saddle.
Speaker 2:Tree fit. A helmet has to fit from front to back and it has to fit from left to right. If it's too narrow, it sits on top. As soon as the horse stumbles, my helmet flies off. If it's too wide, it sits so low I can't see. So the width is important. And then the side of the helmet is important If it sticks out like this, and the width is good.
Speaker 2:Every time I ride around sitting trot, the helmet sits like this now and I look like a goof and I can't see out of this eye. So if it's too steep here, I get a headache. So the sides are important, and the same with the tree. The tree length is important, the width is important. That's the bearing. And let's talk about the angle. Okay, so when the angle of the shoulder matches with the angle of the tree and the cartilage, you can go back and forth, no problem. If it's like this, the cartilage will be bent and you have problems. If it's like this, the horse will stumble. The horse will not go Very rare the problem Unfortunately over 80% of the saddles are like this.
Speaker 1:Why is that? And that's a great segue too. What are most people getting wrong when it comes to saddle fitting? Because I think if you ask them, do you want this saddle to be comfortable for you, yes or no? Do you want this saddle to be comfortable for you, yes or no? Do you want this saddle to be comfortable for your horse, yes or no? Of course everyone's going to say yes. So why is it that there are so many improperly fitted saddles for both rider and horse across the globe? Like, how does that happen?
Speaker 2:I love that question and this is what I encourage everybody to do Ask why, figure out the why, and of course that's the question I ask myself all the time, and there is unfortunately way more than just one answer. The most obvious one is follow the money. If you want to know really what's going on, follow the money. The equine industry just in the States is over a hundred and thirteen billion dollars. It's massive, not just in saddles or saddle pads or barn structures and trailers, everything. And if people are so passionate about horses, they want to do a saddle that fits them. It's comfortable and they have a lot of costs. Especially these days with the high inflation, you know it costs a lot of money to keep a horse. The last thing I want to do is fit a saddle. If marketing does it very clever and I say to you one saddle fits all, it's kind of like I am teaching you and you are an incredible Wimbledon tennis player and I say this tennis right here.
Speaker 1:How did you know?
Speaker 2:I can tell no, I'm kidding, I guess and I say this grip fits every horse, every tennis player, and the shoes you get for me automatic will fit to your foot. And you say okay. And you, first time you hit the ball and that racket spins in your hand, you say, oh, I gotta hit it tighter now. It's so tight that you stiffen up through here. You can't even get your serve going. It takes you three, four hits with the ball to realize the grip sucks. I need my grip where it fits my hand, but in saddle fitting we can put some flowers on it, we can put some stories on it and we make you believe one size fits all horses.
Speaker 1:Or add another saddle pad or a gel pad.
Speaker 2:So why follow the money? Because as long as the saddle doesn't fit, you increase your care in terms of body worker lameness. You blame it on the shoeing, you blame it on the trainer and you spend, spend, spend, spend, spend. If you listen, if you listen to the people who went to university and studied this, not just for this breed or for that breed, for the equine, for all horses anatomy and biomechanics, and you listen to the medical doctors who understand there is actually a physical difference between a pelvis of a male and female. So if you understand the biomechanics of humans and the skeleton and the physiology, and the same with the horse, who would I trust? Somebody who gets a lot of money, sponsorship, sponsorship I was there, I trusted those cost me my horse, cost me my ticket. So I'm done with opinion because we all have belly buttons and I always say opinions are like belly buttons. Everybody has a belly button, everybody has an opinion. So by the time I constantly switch my saddle fitting approaches. There's enough, enough with this unethical saddle fitting. We got to do justice to these horses and we got to give every horse lover, horse owner who has a horse in the heart and loves their horses and wants to save some money.
Speaker 2:Some clear, scientific, clear, scientific, logical answers. Number one why would I ever put a saddle on the shoulder? What moves? Why would I ever pinch on the withers? What makes the horse not go forward? See, the stallions fight. Stallions, horses fight in the herd and when the stallions breed the mare, he bites her in the neck. Two things happen she drops the shoulders. When she drops the shoulders, it pinches the brachial plexus. That's a big, big bulk of nerves between the shoulder joint and the upper arm and the ribs. So they get pinched. That goes down to the leg. She won't go forward. What it also does it gives a reflex to hollow the back. That pulls the pelvis open. The only force that has that possibility is treeless saddles and saddles where the metal plate doesn't fit.
Speaker 2:So if you want a horse inverted, which means hollow on the forehand, kissing spine, and the snowball starts rolling down the hill, which becomes an avalanche of frogs, see why are we reinventing the wheel, when Xenophon, who was a Greek militarist 2,500 years ago, was the first guy who rode it black and white and showed it to the soldiers, I say if you train your horse by bringing the horses back up, see how this goes up. So it's just a plastic horse. When I push it it goes up. Then the hindquarters. See how it goes down. No, that goes up. Hindquarters leg goes underneath. Now he's lying in front so he can dodge the cannonball. He's faster and all his bones on the spine opens. No kissing spine If you ride your horse this way, okay, now this little leg here bends and we have lots of tendon problems, joint problems, kissing spine problems. That's the avalanche of problems. So if we know from our ancestors, forget the riders for one second.
Speaker 2:There is 14 trigger points on each side, so 28 on the horse. There is 14 trigger points on each side, so 28 on the horse, which can be hit by the girth or by the saddle or by your saddle pad, not on purpose, by accident. The horse will give you behavior. You have to ride for 20 minutes to make the pain go numb. See when I ride bareback or treeless saddles or hit one of, okay, everybody can do it.
Speaker 2:Grab a pen, put it in here. So now make a fist Close, open, close. My hand already gets warm and my movement in my hand feels shitty. This pain of the pen will stop eventually. It goes numb will stop. Eventually it goes numb, right, but what does not go numb is the shitty feeling in my head. So this point here eventually disappears again.
Speaker 2:So now let's take a reason why people invented saddles. If I take a saddle tree and push as hard as you can, take a phone, take a little credit card, whatever you want to do, push as hard as you can, nothing, no problems. Here I doubled my pressure, it doesn't hurt, it doesn't interfere with my tendon, ligaments or muscles. So once the saddle got invented they say, okay, let's put it there where no trigger points are the best part to here. Go back to tennis. Let's say I'm this ghost who hovers around you and every time you reach to hit your serve I hit your funny bone. You go like this and everybody's going to say what's wrong with Jen? She's never going to finish her tournament with that kind of. Does she have Tourette's? What's wrong with jen? She's never going to finish her her tournament with that kind of. Does she have Tourette's?
Speaker 1:what? What's going on with her?
Speaker 2:that's just my natural swing, it's fine so if I hit your funny bone you can feel it all the way to the pinky. See, you don't do these movement purposely. I overwrite your system. All these doctors, veterinarians, biomechanics, osteopaths are saying saddle fitting is the easiest in the world. If people can identify all these trigger points, what makes these horse do unintentional movements and permanently lame? So the cool part is I don't have to go by opinion anymore. I have actually logical explanation. I have gait analysis, computerized saddle pads, heart monitors. If I really doubt, is it really true? See, with this here I can feel it. I also have the pain scale now. So my recommendation to everybody out there I like the kiss sample Keep it simple.
Speaker 2:When you look at the horse, you look at it from the back. This triangle is probably the worst area a child can ever hit. Nothing should ever sit on the spine, ligaments, motivators or spinal nerves Never. This is the longest muscle on the horse's body, which is very thick and it takes a lot of weight. So if we have over thousands of years built a saddle with that kind of a knowledge, here comes the good part, now that veterinarians say, yeah, they have pain receptors and they actually have tools to prove pain or not pain, heal horses. It proves that our ancestors I'm talking about saddles were built when horses was necessity. Today I have a car, I have a tank. I necessity. Today I have a car, I have a tank, I have a jet, I have a boat, I get from here to there and I can win my war with other things. I don't need horses anymore. Horses are, we don't need them anymore. Of course we need them. We are horse crazy. They do so much for us, right.
Speaker 1:We need them to jump over obstacles for no reason but for our passion and because we love that yeah.
Speaker 2:And you know I don't know if I mentioned this to you in our prior talks I also encourage anybody who lives in North America to visit the Kentucky Horse Park in Lexington. There's a beautiful horse museum and you will see the evolution of the horse, how small these horses were, and the first time people sat on horses they were sitting on the croup right on the butt. Why, and they explain why, because back then the horse was not that tall. The only way to get the weight of the soldier's or person's feet was sitting on the croup Wow, it made sense. Were sitting on the crew Wow, it made sense.
Speaker 2:Fast forward 1,000 years, thousands of years. You see people all of a sudden sit in the middle of the horse's back. So if you look at the old art, english hunting or English racing, horse racing, the jockeys had really long stirrup leathers and they were sitting in the middle of the back. And then comes this another military guy, caprilli, says let's sit in an area where today everybody sits. When you look at the rodeo rider, you look at the bullfighter, you look at all beginners or advanced bareback riders, you always see them sitting at one spot. You don't see them sitting on the croup anymore.
Speaker 2:Or in the middle of the pack because the horse's back moves, walk, trot, canter. So why would I want to sit here? Where it's bouncy, where do they sit? Where it's not bouncy, you snuggle right up towards the closest part of the horse's withers. So when you look from the top down, that's also where there's a narrow spot for your legs to go and when you sit on that spot the horse can spin, can turn, can stop and you feel in balance. So when we now get the experts in again, you know they say this is the balance point of the horse at the sternum plate. If you align that with the rider's sternum plate, you know they say this is the balance point of the horse at the sternum plate. If you align that with the right of sternum plate, you're in balance. Now if the shoulder, hips and heels is one line, then the person is standing, like nature made us humans with a. We call that horizontal spine. No, we call it a vertical spine. And the vertical spine has four curves One, two, three, four.
Speaker 2:These are shock absorption to your disc. Remember I said one of the problems was disc problems. So if I have a rider who sits on the horse in the wrong gender or wrong sex saddle, the rider cannot. You see it in treeless saddles. You see it bareback. You cannot sit in a correct seat, correct seat, and I would like to show you this. Takes a little bit to find, so oh yeah, here we go. This is written by a veterinarian who is sick and tired of people hurting the horse's back. Guys, have longer tailbone, lower curvature in the back, your butt, cheeks, your gluteus maximus it's very close to the horse, high pubic symphysis and we can put our parts left or right if the woman sits in the correct seat, like I showed, told you with my cast first. This impact is the crotch, her balance point. Hip socket is more full, more curvature in the lower back, shorter tailbone. Look at the distance from there to there.
Speaker 1:Okay, so there is no support.
Speaker 2:So if you don't sit in the saddle like this it's kind of like taking one leg off the tripod Okay, you instantly will fall what we also know as the chair seat. Then your leg goes over a wide area where your hip hurts. Remember I said hip joint was a problem. These are all pictures from veterinarians, by the way, who are sick and tired helping horses and healing horses, and the jackhammer on top. The rider can't sit soft, so I'm going to come back to that later.
Speaker 1:How many issues do you think are the direct results of poor saddle fit?
Speaker 2:the first book I ever read about. It were master trainers from germany in the early, early 1900s. 1904, udo burger wrote a book. The rider forms the horse and he says it's absolutely crucial. Like Like this people here. This is the Spanish riding school. Since 400 years they teach the pliable seat. So remember I said, shoulder, hips and heels. It's not there, right? I call that the perpendicular line. If you don't have a perpendicular line, you can't have a supple, loose seat. You can't Because what I showed you, the skeleton there, the saddle, doesn't fit. If you sit in a frame made for a male pelvis, you can't have a soft seat. Look how the toes and the knees turn out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's not in a straight line.
Speaker 2:So that goes back to what I'm saying. You're a beautiful tennis player with very shitty shoes and a shitty tennis racket. Sure, you're still a good tennis player, but you struggle so hard and you get frustrated Now when we talk about another being the animal who has absolutely no say. Of course they have a say.
Speaker 1:They can flight or fight To your point they will experience a numbness where, once you've ridden them for 30 minutes, maybe there is an issue, but it's numb for them now, and now they're compensating in other ways.
Speaker 2:That's right.
Speaker 2:So if I pull this back together. My biggest advice, for anybody who's listening get yourself a normal pair of jeans that have a seam in your instep. You would never ride on it because you know it will hurt you. So put these jeans on and go to a tack shop who sells saddles, or borrow a saddle when you try a saddle and then you sit that saddle either on the saddle stand or on the horse. The horse is not moving. You take your feet out, or do your stirrer pretend you have your foot, what we call in the riding position? I'm gonna show you what I'm oh here. By the way, this is the picture how the rider hangs from the ceiling and the horses on the treadmill oh, that's fascinating.
Speaker 2:Isn't that something. How fast science goes, you know. So now you're sitting in the saddle. Okay, pretend there's a saddle. You have that nice line. Toes are forward, okay, heels are down.
Speaker 2:And now what I encourage people without leaning forward or back? And now what I encourage people without leaning forward or back visualize I can do it in my seat. I'm sucking my belly button right now to my spine. You didn't see me doing anything up here. I can also stick my tummy as fast forward as possible. So all I do while I'm sitting let me see if I have my pelvis here All that I'm doing while I'm sitting is sucking my belly button in, sticking my belly button out, and a good rider can do a sitting trot.
Speaker 2:This is what's called the pliable seat. If you can't do this because the seam in your jeans rubs you just on this little exercise, if you can feel the seam, do not buy the saddle. It will never fit the horse because you become the silent jackhammer. Sure, you could say, well, my pelvis might be stiff, but I can do that when I trot. You've seen a lot of people do that. Or they're looking down and go like this Okay. So you see a lot of unwanted bad position, because they just don't know what they don't know.
Speaker 1:Say there's a mom and a dad, they have a kid horse crazy. Fortunately, we're in 2025 and not in the 70s, where they were just saying, hey, do what we've always done. This is the saddle that you're going to be given and there are lots of options and they can do the research. What would you say would be the best way to go about finding the right saddle for their child and the horse, especially if there's so many different options? You have the trainers influence, inevitably depending on the kind of stable you're at. But for them who wants, for the person who wants to do their own research and come up with the best solution and the best saddle possible For both the horse and rider, what would you say to them? How do they go about tackling that daunting task when they're not riders themselves and they might not have been born into the industry?
Speaker 2:First and the most important part, specialize what you want to do. It's very rare that you can find a saddle you can do everything in it. If I want to barrel racer, that's a barrel racing Western saddle. Very hard to do this in a hunter jumper saddle.
Speaker 1:Well, on that note, do all-purpose saddles not exist? Is that a myth?
Speaker 2:Well, the old saying is all-purpose, no-purpose. But first I decide English or Western, because English and Western have over 13 different disciplines. So once you know English or Western and let's say English, and I kind of like to do both, a little bit dressage, a little bit jumping, and that's why general purpose saddles are there. But if you already know I'm going to be an event rider or I'm a jumping rider or a dressage rider or an endurance rider, the saddlesizes there. So let's say, like, back to your question what's the first thing? Find a saddle. Color, price, feel is the number one. So when you find a saddle, it says can I please sit in the male and the female version? If the retailer says I don't have it, walk, because how do you know what to feel for it? If they say oh, you know what, break it in. Break it in, it's going to be okay.
Speaker 2:When it's broken in, in the meantime you got back used to something really uncomfortable. It's used, you lose money. Or if the company is really really good and exchanges non-stop, eventually you said this is getting annoyed. I guess this is it. Nobody would ever play tennis with a shitty grip. When you're a good player or beginner player, you just grab him, says, oh, this feels natural, this feels good. That's the feel I'm talking about.
Speaker 2:So when you sit in the saddle, go with the feel. Can you do the stomach exercise I call it? Can you roll your pelvis while the saddle is in the cross, tie on the in the in this tack shop, or while the hook silence on the horse before the horse even walks? Can you roll your pelvis back and forth without any interference on your crotch or your butt pain? What's the butt pain? Butt pain is when you got that little cramp in your butt cheek and you lift your knee up, I got my hip cramp. So we need to understand just on the inside of the leg is the sciatic nerve. So if the tree doesn't fit you in your upper inner thighs, it's just a matter of time when you hit that nerve. So go for the feel first, so you know the discipline.
Speaker 2:Then you try the different seats in the same model and then you're going to ask the customer do you have that model in the disposable and non-disposable? Disposable means every time the farrier comes, the body worker, the veterinarian, the trainer says your saddle doesn't fit, get rid of it, get a new saddle. The industry makes saddles which you cannot adjust. The non-disposable ones are saddles that can be adjusted in the width what we talked about earlier, angle and, like humans, the majority of the horses are dominant more on the right. Same like humans, they have the appendix on the right and horses also have the left eye more dominant, and that, of course, horses don't have collarbone leads sometimes to one shoulder being bigger due to the place they grew up in, due to the job they did. So if I have a horse with a bigger left shoulder, I want a saddle where I can accommodate what we call the orthopedic fit, because, remember, the metal is always stronger than the saddle. So that saddle should be wool flocked or at least the panel, what I can change in the length remember I was talking about the helmet length and it should also have the ability to change the curvature.
Speaker 2:Western, south on the market, like this. We started this. You can see it on our saddles. We have English saddles. We on the market. Like this. We started this. You can see it on our saddles. We have English saddles, we also have. I thought you were going to ask me the difficult question what if the family wants one saddle? We also have a saddle where you can change the male and the female seat so husband and wife can ride in it. You can change the stirrer or fender position and you can change the length of the saddle, including what I mentioned.
Speaker 1:How does that work with the idea of sharing a saddle within the same family, men and women? How would that work in terms of you know, you brought the saddle home? I don't know if I've ever seen that.
Speaker 2:Okay. So let's say the base is like this and you have what we put on here seat foam. What if I have a split ground seat, which means you can actually have another layer on top here, what goes between the seat, leather and the tree? So like an orthopedic insole in your shoe when people have flat feet, high arches, right? So think about the shape of the form. One. They normally come with four sets. They're four different, two for female, four male, and you can move them around, right. So think about shin pads for horses. Now you got this in the ground seat, in western as well as in english. It's phenomenal, and the price is anywhere from 500 to 15 000. You know, there's nothing wrong with a good used one. If you want something with silver and fancy and blah, blah, blah with many sponsorship names attached to it, go for it.
Speaker 1:Is there a big difference between? Is it possible to get the type of saddle that you're talking about that does properly fit both rider and horse, that lasts a long time? Can you get that at a decent price? Where does price come in? Why are there some saddles out there that are $15,000, but there are other settles that are a couple hundred dollars? How does that work?
Speaker 2:This is my favorite topic. On my black T-shirt you don't see any swoosh, any advertising, and my friend always has to have either a swoosh on it or certain brands on it. So he pays a little bit more for his t-shirt than I do. They're made in the same place, so you're paying for the name. So when Grand Prix show riders or very prestigious companies put their name on it, some saddle company is very, very well known in Paris for fashion as well and they actually have a saddle out there for $14,995 because of their prestige name.
Speaker 2:So same with suits. You can buy a suit that's custom-made by your local suit maker. You're happy. You've got beautiful material. But if you want that fancy Italian name with that suit, you'll happy. You've got beautiful material, but if you want that fancy Italian name with that suit, you pay for it. So the cost is always heavy, influenced by the marketing and where it's made. So for me the most expensive saddle is what doesn't fit my anatomy and what doesn't fit my horses growing, changing, three-dimensional shape, which means I only pay $2,000 to it. But if I have to do this five times while I have this horse, that's $10,000. And I hurt the horse and I crippled myself. That's a lot of money. So money is only in relation to if it's long lasting. The saddle could cost you 90 cents a day If the saddle really truly fits my body, fits the horses I ride and I can maintain it and I have it for a long time. Now, if I amortize that 90 cents a day, is that too much money? I don't know.
Speaker 1:I imagine that a lot of the others to your point they might have. You know, marketing is obviously a huge component of increased price. But what about the actual materials? Is there something to be said about? When you have a really expensive saddle, they are indeed using the finest leather out there, or is that not necessarily the case?
Speaker 2:I love that question. When I learned this trade in 1978, I started, we were really, really drilled into. That saddle has to last at least 40, 50 years. The seat leather was so tough, the skirt and the flap leather was so thick. You don't see any saddles made in that area where the seat has wrinkles, the seat has holes, the flap has worn up, stitches has gone, okay, but they are hard as a rock and they take forever to break in. A real cowboy people who actually still move cows. They don't have seat foam. They have a very plain, strong western sound.
Speaker 2:These times, these days, are over. People want instant gratification. We live in the time of time, which means everything has to go fast. I don't want to break it in and I want something soft immediately Because we're not dealing just with rodeo riders or carboys, we're dealing with the baby boomers, aging baby boomers. He says I don't need something that lasts for 45 years. I want something now that is super comfortable and I want a little bling on it. I was for 20, 30 years against putting anything on the saddle because it's called a horse show. When a horse goes to a show, it's judged how the horses look like. Now it's turned into a people show. They'll add the clothing, the glittery helmet, glittery style. I get it, I totally get it. It's supposed to be fun, the fashion. But over the time when I started, it's almost 50 years now to where we are today, people want something soft and nice and cheap, sticky.
Speaker 2:So you have leather anywhere, from buffalo, all the pig skin, the goat skin, all gone, buffalo, very rare. Most of the time we use cow skin and Italian calf skin, cow skin and Italian calf skin. Now, if you think way back to the Roman times, good good leather that hides gets auctioned on the world market. And you want cows that roam free. You don't want any cow that have a lot of holes because they live in an environment where a lot of mosquitoes or insects are. You don't want cows North American cows who live in pens, never been in the light, and lay in their own poop and have their burned skin. The tannery doesn't care for those. You want cows that roam free over the hills. That skin is pre-stretched, no marks, nothing. So these Italians have seekers for hundreds and hundreds of years. So that's where good leather stands. So the good leather we want today is very fine, very soft, has a lot of stitches, but of course they wear and tear. It's nearly not as good.
Speaker 2:A good example is the cars. The cars were built in the 50s. The doors boom. When the doors closed, the metal was that thick. We didn't care about gas consumption back in those days. Now, when you touch the door too hard, you dented the door. It's all thin plastic and the cars are much lighter and better fuel efficiency. So with the time, not just the car industry, also the saddle industry changed with the demand. The demand not from the professionals or from the soldiers, the demand from the baby boomers who says I ride every day a week, I ride for one hour. I'm not going to use that saddle all day long, I ride one hour. I want something soft, nice, thank you. And that's where the industry changed to Interesting.
Speaker 1:Do you accommodate both the English saddles and the Western saddles?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and the racing industry.
Speaker 1:And racing.
Speaker 2:I'm big. No, no, I didn't want to go in Western, I didn't want to go in racing. But the reason why? Because in racing and in Western, both industries start the horse at one and a half years. At one and a half years, at two years they're already racing or competing Western or English, and all these bones are very soft At what does it say here?
Speaker 2:One and a half years, that's how fast the horse is. This is the maturity timeline for the horse. Okay, so here you show one of the horses' spine has fully matured six and a half. The scapula hasn't even finished it. Four. So this year, not until they're three. So if you have race horses and Western horses, so young people came to me and says, johan, if you really want to help all the horses and people who love horses, what divisions they do, put yourself in this position. Are you a father? Yes, would you want your little kids who go to school with shoes, what fit, with a backpack, what's not too heavy? Would you want that child to grow up without deformity? Can you please help these horses? So we developed a Western Saddles with split bars, what?
Speaker 1:do the split bars do.
Speaker 2:The split bars mean you can change your western saddle from horse to horse to any horse you want to ride. You learn this with us together online, and you can fit literally your western saddle to any horse you ever want without crippling the horse, and it also has an interchangeable ground seat. You can have that with your husband, your daughter. You can make it bigger or smaller, the bars smaller or larger, whatever. So I wanted to invent something that really makes a difference In racing. There's many horses. You know, before the Kentucky Derby was actually gone there were five horses dying prior that week. Many died too early because of equipment failure. So we have that done with the Prince of Dubai and all over Europe and South America and South Africa, and all that we do is follow the same principles Stay off the spine, stay off the lung meridian point and the gait analysis is all what the coach sees. The horse stays straight, the horse has strides, longer strides, lower heartbeat. That's how the racing industry adopted our saddles.
Speaker 2:In the English saddles we have also the lighter saddles where you can change your saddle from massage to baroque. You just keep the interior. So that saddle is truly a saddle for somebody who wants to do it all with their saddle. It's very, very light. It's not leather, it's sheepskin. The whole saddle is made out of sheepskin and the interior tree is where you have the split bar for the horses, like the Western, and the split ground seat, like the Western. So you can see you've got something super light, different material, very inexpensive to what the product offers you For the traditionalist. No, no, I want a leather saddle. I want a jumper, a dressage it's available too. Right, I want a jumper a dressage.
Speaker 1:It's available too, right, so you accommodate, it sounds like, everyone from every stage, in every discipline.
Speaker 2:I had to, because only that way I can fulfill my calling. Stop crippling these horses by not knowing what I don't know. So that's what we teach worldwide online, and our products we can fit online with the customer who now has the phone, who can measure the horse, and so the world really came all the way to a nice round circle to protect these beautiful horses yeah, this has been fascinating.
Speaker 1:I'm inspired to go saddle shopping, for you know all the horses that I have that need to be fitted. But on that note, so if someone's listening and they want to learn more, see the saddles, try the saddles where can they go to do that?
Speaker 2:So on our website here you can either go schlesecom or saddleforwomencom and you can type in what you're looking for. We have people literally around the world who would come to your house. We call them saddle agonists. Together with the German National Riding School, we came up with other title and saddle fitters. Saddle agonist is a person who measures your horse, measures the saddle and measures you and understands the difference between static fit and dynamic fit, because many, many people just come here and say, oh, that looks good, yeah, that saddle fits. I don't care what they think For me, the saddle needs to fit me and my horse when everything is moving.
Speaker 2:Can I jump in the saddle balance? Can I have my sitting trot? Can I feel my horse suffer? Does he lick? Does he come through the pole? Is he bending? That's when the saddle should fit when it's moving. That's the difference of a dynamic fit versus static fit. So if you say, oh, you know what, I live in an area where I don't even attack shop but I have an ability to do a little video or film or, like you and I do, you know we look and speak over the internet.
Speaker 2:We literally developed a system that was through COVID, which calls the virtual custom fit system and it's dropping the market by storm. Because flying back and forth, driving on the highway, going from A to B, cost money. Customer is willing to pay, but it adds up the cost. So I wanted to come up. What if we turn everybody in, like 200 years ago, where every rider understands where's the 14 points? Can I fit my saddle myself with somebody on FaceTime or with my phone? Eventually, just like you when you were a little kid, you can bridle your own horse. Now you can now put the saddle on yourself. You learn to do this, and saddle fitting is nothing else than identify where what hurts the horse, and that is the only way I can help every horse in the world. The customer wants to save money Because other than that, people don't care.
Speaker 1:Yeah, customer wants to save money, because other than that, people don't care. Yeah, yeah, you have to take out the marketing and the bling and just go back to the first principles of all the things that you had just said, and thinking about the anatomy and the longevity of the horse and the longevity of yourself. I bet that's difficult for a lot of people, though, because you go into the saddle shop and there's beautiful saddles and you've seen them online and you've seen the instagram, and you just want that saddle, even though you haven't even sat in it or put it on your horse yet. So I feel like there's probably a lot of separation of what you think you want versus what both you and your horse actually require.
Speaker 2:Well, it's also the financial problem. You know, let's say you're just being told by your coach or, like me, I finally have achieved with the saddle what I wanted to be sponsored in, and you finally got what you really, really, really wanted. And you learned oh, that's why he bites me, or that's why he throws me up, or this is why he constantly has colic, or this is why he has rhythm uh heart monitors and all this rhythm uh heart monitors and all this.
Speaker 2:And then you say, well, obviously, I'm not going to do that again, but I just bought it for a hundred dollars, a thousand for five, for eight. Who cares how much? When you're attached to something you really, really love you, you sometimes have to fight with your cognitive dissonance, right, you have to fight with your brain. This guy here on this shoulder says get rid of it, it kills your horse, the other says no, it's beautiful.
Speaker 2:You listen to these two people on your shoulders who twitter in your ear. I always say listen here, listen in your heart. You know most people who are horse owners love, love, the frequency they have with their horses body and that's why they're such healers, these horses. Why wouldn't I hurt my healer? So once people know what they need to do, it's easy.
Speaker 1:Amazing advice. I feel like I have a whole new way of looking at them. I want to see your saddles. Better than that, I want to go and try saddles with you there, and then you pinpoint all the different components of it. I think that would be a very fascinating experience. I really appreciate you coming on and for sharing all this.
Speaker 2:This has been great yeah, your, your wish is very easy to fulfill because you live in such a high density area where, like our team comes through there with a van full of saddles any model you can imagine and unfortunately not everybody has the opportunity to have somebody come out, but in your case they come four or five times through your area a year awesome all right.
Speaker 1:so then, for everyone listening. So that's saddlesforwomencom is the best way to learn more and to contact your team and then to be able to do that video consult or talk with some of your team when they're coming through, to meet up in person and get that saddle and basically take it from there and then also your Instagram handle as well. What is that if people want to follow along on Instagram?
Speaker 2:You know what I'm embarrassed to say? I have to look it up because I'm not doing social media is that?
Speaker 1:is that for? Is that for the? Uh, the gen z?
Speaker 2:yeah, that's right, um, it's um just schleser. We got uh schleser dash eu for europeans. And then we got uh schleser like my name s-c-C-H-L-E-E-S-E, and you will find us.
Speaker 1:Amazing. Well, thanks so much for coming on and for sharing all of that. It's been fascinating.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I enjoyed it a lot too. And there's one advice I like to give everybody when you are at the time where you want to find out, ask the fitter straight up front. Are at the time where you want to find out, ask the fitter straight up front are you an ethical or unethical saddle fitter? Because this is really what goes on my skin lately. It's because people, just because of greed, sell fit something what is, and they know, wrong to the horse. The consumer thinks, oh, I had a professional. And I now think it's okay because I had a professional fitted.
Speaker 2:By asking this direct question, you need to be a little bit brave. You've got to put your big girl pants on or big boy pants and you've got to say are you an ethical or unethical? What does that mean? Of course I'm an ethical. Well, would you fit a saddle that is clearly too long and hurts the horse in the kidney or hurts him on the lung meridian point? Well, we can shim it, we can stuff it and it's okay. So, right there, walk away.
Speaker 2:Then ask can your saddle you're selling me be adjusted on 12 spots Spinal clearance, saddle length, width, angle, orthopedic Spots spinal clearance, saddle length, width, angle, orthopedic. If they can't. They're selling you an we call it disposable saddle. They're selling you something that will work for one, two months, maybe a year or two, knowing that you need another saddle very fast. Okay, so ask all these questions before, watch their directions and hopefully he's a rider, because when I speak to a professional and I feel he's not coming through to the right, he's leaning in my left leg or whatever, and he looks at me and says I can give you a deal. I am good with numbers, but if he doesn't speak the horsey language, he or she is not a rider. Bye, bye.
Speaker 1:Put him in the hot seat and walk away. Love it. You've got to protect your horse.
Speaker 2:I am good with numbers, but if he doesn't speak the horsey language, he or she is not a rider.
Speaker 1:Bye, bye Put him in the hot seat and walk away. Love it. You've got to protect your horse. Great advice, all right, cool, we'll wrap with that. Thank you so much and looking forward to seeing your saddles and more healthy, better fitted horses with their saddles in the future. So cheers to that.
Speaker 2:Thanks for having me.
