George gets a pressie

21 April 2001
Well George has got lucky. After a recent visit to the USA, where I tried cutting on a western cutting horse for the first time ... now that's something amazing ... I decided that George needed a nice western bridle.

Also while I was there I found these really amazing saddle pads ... I have not seen anything like them. Seeing a George has a sensitive back, I brought him back one to try ...

25 April 2001
No sooner has George got a new high tech saddle pad, I found another amazing saddle pad at the Equus 2001 exhibition.

The saddle cloth above has some air bags inserted between the saddle and the horse - you can see the air tubes hanging down ready for the saddle cloth to be set up. The air bags pumped up slightly to ensure an even load bearing surface over the horses back. There is also a suspension effect that reduces concussion. One of the other clever elements of the cloth is a fixing that holds the saddle cloth into the saddle away from the horses spine. This effect can be clearly seen from the rear view pictures. In fact, with George, the only thing wrong with the saddle cloth is that it is white!

Now on the other hand, the saddle pad I got from the states is also brilliant, but in significantly different ways. This pad is made from a honeycomb structure. It exhibits many of the positive qualities of a gell pad, and then some, without many of the problems seen in other pads.

One of its most significant features is that the pad is an perforated unit consisting mostly of air. Consequently air freely circulates round the horses back keeping it both dry and cool. Because of the honeycomb structure it doesn't sheer laterally like a gell pad does, and the shock absorbing features of the pad seem very good. Its structure responds to pressure in an unusual manner that aleviates undesirable pressure on suceptable points.

Both these products are far superiour to anything I have seen anywhere in the world. They are both remarkable peieces of engineering and well worth looking at.