Quick update on the Barefoot Arizona

Esther.D

Esther.D

Moderator
Jan 3, 2003
8,576
0
36
46
Shetland!
maenoferren.mysite.freeserve.com
Well it officially gets the thumbs up from Alfie and Stephen. The western girth we have was a little long and the pad we were using a little slippy so they only had a 10 min ride as it was sliding, but Stephen was very happy with it (other than the slipping) and Alfie looked very happy in it. His previous saddle was slightly narrow hence the reason he has not done any great length of time on Alfie at once - if Stephen put his weight forwards Alfie would put his ears back as it was pinching him. However he didn't put his ears back once with the Arizona even when Stephen wriggled about to straighten it up, and was walking out beautifully.

So thumbs up so far just need to sort the slipping (we have had problems with the pad we used slipping under other saddles though and the girth was a little long, so not utterly surprised, it should be sortable with a bit of fiddling about. The pad we were using was just a western felt pad initially for their first ride to get a feel of it, and the slippery felt on a shiny, slippery Alfie was not a good combination! :rolleyes:
 
Don't know why they are called Barefoot? Can anyone else enlighten us?

This is the saddle http://www.boomloosrijden.nl/boomloosrijdensiteframes/afbeeldingen/BF Arizona.jpg
have some pics of it on Alfie - if the camera batteries are still alive I will download them, if not will charge batteries and add them later. We don't have the proper western fenders for it yet so it doesn't look quite like a 'proper' western saddle yet.
 
Not brilliant pics I'm afraid as it was getting dark on Sunday night when they tried it..and the whole thing was slipping rather so if the pad looks a bit odd it is because it was vanishing out of the side :rolleyes: And of course it will look better with fenders rather than English stirrups. Going to play around with pads for wither clearance, this was just a trial run.

Alfie looks a bit grumpy here but that was because he had just tried his one naughty trick of snatching the reins :rolleyes:

Incidentally as you can see, Alfie has now joined the others in being able to be 'parked' unheld until he is wanted :D

he needs a new bridle now though - the purple clashes rather so we'll have to do him a nice western one to match.
 

Attachments

  • Alfie1.JPG
    Alfie1.JPG
    23.6 KB · Views: 22
  • Alfie2.JPG
    Alfie2.JPG
    17.7 KB · Views: 20
Last edited:
Yep, its a western treeless saddle. Stephen wanted to go western with Alfie but he really is not an easy shape to find a western saddle to fit..so we decided to go western treeless. Although both of them are basically riding English at the moment in it. Apparently it is extremely comfy. I have been promised a ride in it, and on Alfie of course, as soon as I am back in the saddle.
 
We'll probably get strange looks :D The nearest person I actually know to us who rides Western is cvb and she is 150 miles or so away! There must be people closer obviously but I have never seen them. No, thats not quite true actually, one of the local Parelli group rides his arab mare western. I get strange looks for riding a pony, so he might as well get his share for riding western :D Actually I am amazed how much like a treed western saddle it looks when on the horse, obviously it will look better with the fenders, but certainly at first glance you would never know it was treeless.

Would have liked to get one for Rupert too but I think I am going to have to get a Cheyenne as all the western versions seem to be longer so even the smallest size Arizona will probably swamp him. Plus I will be doing a bit of dressage/jumping with him (our yard does clear round jumping and dressage days so aiming to get to some of them next year) so the Cheyenne would suit that better.
 
newrider.com
Top Bottom
Back