Are you an all-round sporty type, or a rider through and through?

Riding is my first love and I try to ride or school my horse 5-6 days a week in the summer with the lovely long evenings! I go kickboxing twice a week for my fitness, try to go jogging a couple times a week before work in the morning and i also fit in some pole dancing when I can! I find it all improves my fitness and my riding has definitely improved no end since I started working on my fitness :) Oh and i go snowboarding for 2 weeks a year! want to have a go at dog sledding next year :D I'm no longer a sit around not doing much sort of person and like to keep busy!
 
All round. I was very sporty in school, played hockey for my county and athletics for my region up to under 18s. Also did gymnastics and swimming for my school. Horses took over in competitive terms, but I've always tried to stay fit and have started running again and do 5-7 miles three or four times a week, trying to bring the times down. I also cycle a lot. I did pilates until the classes stopped, and still do some yoga when I can. It all helps my riding, just by being generally fit but also in terms of core stability and body awareness. We ask the horses to be fit and work hard, so we should think the same way about ourselves! :)
 
Defintely a Rider only- having a full time job, 4 horses in and keeping the yard ticking over nicely occupies more than enough of my time, then add in a few shows and that leaves very little time!

I think I would collapse in a heap if I tried running or anything over sporty!, but when you've been riding for years, it does make you strong!

Ha ha my (non horsey) boss said to me the other week to go for a run at lunch time as I didn't have much to do- I was like you must be having a laugh, I save all my energy for when I ride the horses after 5pm ( I think non horsey folk think we just sit on our horses and that's it!!), oh and I beat a man in the office at arm wrestling (not really something that I'm proud of!!), he was very embarrased though!
 
I do a lot of competitive sports, showjumping of which is only one. I used to do triathlon to GB team level and be a county level runner. I still run pretty seriously and am now into competitive mountain biking. I still swim. I find quite a strong crossover between cycling and riding in that one benefits the other. I do find I'm a lot stronger than some people who are bigger than me and this is undoubtedly from doing other sports. tbh I find a lot of horsy people a bit obsessive and I think doing other sports gives me a bit more perspective and probably gets me and the horses better results comeptition wise than if thats all I had to do.
 
How do you have time to do all these things as well as doing your horses/work?? I'm out doing the horse/at work from about 7.30 - 8.30 and I really couldn't be bothered to start doing some other sport then! I think pther people must have more evergy than me!
 
In the distant past I did a lot of athletics to a reasonable level, and also went skiing regularly, these days, with a full time job and 4 horses to do I have little time for anything more demanding than the odd game of badminton
 
All round sportyness here.

At school I played hockey and netball at county level. I was on all the teams.

Now in addition to the horses I run. My favourite distance is Marathon and for my last marathon my training peaked at 70 miles a week. I'm easing back into training now (running with a buggy is VERY hard) and I've got some *big* running ambitions to tide me over whilst I get the horse back to where he should be :)
 
Starbucks said:
How do you have time to do all these things as well as doing your horses/work?? I'm out doing the horse/at work from about 7.30 - 8.30 and I really couldn't be bothered to start doing some other sport then! I think pther people must have more evergy than me!
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Well now that I work for myself and not full time hours, I have no excuses! But when I was working full time as a solicitor, I used to run at lunchtime with the exception of Tuesday and Thursday when I cycled and then I would run in the evenings at the track. I didn't ride on track nights otherwise I would ride when I got in from work and then cycle, in winter it would be the turbo trainer for the bike. Its not that hard to fit it all in really, and a lot of my sessions were high quality or intervals, not junk mileage. However my race results in tri/du got really good during this time and I did a lot of running pbs so it seemed to work well. Oh, and apart from summer, I always always have full livery.
 
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