Do you remember the first time you fell off a horse / pony?

I don’t remember the first time but I remember two that particularly stuck in my brain. The first a feisty welsh cob I was sharing, riding around at a trot, it decided to spook and bronc along the middle of the arena, splat I went hands and knees. Did ligament damage to my knee that’s never been the same! The second was after I’d ridden TBs and all the naughty horses on shares, I went back to the riding school while I was on a break, was put on this little cob called Eric, bearing in mind I’m 5’8 and Eric was 14.3hh so I felt huge and not balanced. Cantering around, he went to cut the corner I said no but he cut the corner and I was deposited on the floor. Nosebleed, definitely knocked out, and for a scary couple of second I couldn’t feel my legs. All was fine I jumped right up stupidly, was told I had to be collected and wasn’t allowed to drive home, rang my dad, who told me to drive home!
 
Vividly - Diamond. Black cob type with a white star. He bolted across the field when he saw some field mates being fed at the gate - there was a jump in the way so he jumped it. I stuck that bit - although I landed in front of the saddle which hurt my bits - only to be dumped when he swerved to a stop at the gate. I would have been about 6 I think. I think it was an early pony club rally - I remember a woman instructor being very cross at the kids who had fed ponies when a lesson was going on and certainly we did have rallies in that field. Diamond wasn't mine - my pony was called Puff (unimagintively). No idea where Puff was. (Fell off him a few times too!). I might not have got him until later that year. With a gap of 50+ years some details are foggy - but I remember that fall very clearly.
 
I was 5 years old and I was having weekly lessons at a riding school 10 minutes walk from my house.

Every week I'd be put on this hairy little thug called Pepper. He knew every trick in the book and he dropped me every single week without fail!
 
Mrs B said:
No, but it happened A LOT!

I was 3 and used to get bucked off a small blue roan called Smokey more times than I remained in the saddle. But I do remember assuming that falling off was utterly normal every time you did manage to get back in the saddle (which had a red felt seat and leather flaps and a handle. The handle didn't help much ... :D )
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Me too; for much of my childhood I spent more time on the floor than on ponies. My first pony we actually owned could buck like a rodeo star - I soon learned to sit vertical bucks in a saddle as flat and shiny as a greased tray.
 
Before even getting on a pony i had an incident with a herd.
my new friend had a pony, she was about 8 and me about 6, wee things....and she said ‘lets go and get my pony’....so she gets a bucket with some pony nuts in it, hands it to me, and we head to a field.
(This would be the first time i get to go on the back of a pony, i am soooo excited!)

We go through a gate to a really big field....i dont see any horses initially, so we’re walking into the open of the field....then i see a herd in the distance and im sooooo excited i squeel “oh horses!” and start running to them...which causes the ponynuts in the bucket im carrying to rattle and shake....which the whole herd hears, sending them into a prompt gallop in our direction!

My friend freaks and yells ‘run!” so i follow her towards post and barbed wire fencing set in the middle of the field. In the rush and panic i thought i’d be small enough to run under the barbed wire line...but was 2 inches taller, so i ended up with a long gouged cut on my forehead...which bled profusely all down my face.
My friend freaks at my injury so we just go home without pony. I was so disappointed!
Her mum was very cross with her, and she was banned from riding for the week! I felt so bad for her but i had no idea what the bucket of nuts was for!
It was my first chance to see a horse up close that wasn’t a donkey on a beach!
 
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Yep! Really cheeky Welsh A that should not have been allowed to be a riding school pony. I was seven, she was five. She took off like the clappers around the school, threw in a buck and I came off. I remember so vividly having rubber in my rubber riding boots (you know, those horrible rigid black ones!) and crying to my mum.
 
My first pony was a very naughty little welsh mountain pony so i was falling off all the time so I cannot remember my first time. I do remember walking 2 or 3 miles home, carrying one stirrup and my whip and with mud down my jods, as i had fallen off and my pony had set off without me. Decades before mobile phones so the first my parents knew was when pony turned up without me! i was so embarrassed!!!
 
I remember it was off a pony called Coco in the riding school but don't remember anything else about it. The first one I remember the detail of was a saddle slip - they hadn't tightened the girth and mid trot it all went sideways.
 
I must have been about 12 or so, on holiday, on an hour or two hour pony trek through the woods at a walk.

The pony decided to graze. He put his front feet through the fence by the side of the track, under the bottom wire, stuck his head through between the bottom and top wires, I went over his shoulder and managed to stop myself from rolling down the bank into the stream.
 
Romeo - my favourite riding school horse, he was the culprit. He threw me in the sand in the indoor arena. He spooked, galopped off and bucked once - off I went. I think I was 10 or 11.
 
I was 10 years old I was riding a cob that decided to stop at a fance I done a 360 flip in the air and landed on my back half way across the arena .
 
Not my first, but I do remember coming off as a small child. In my memory I was knocked out but whether I actually was or not I don't know. However I do remember suddenly being face down on the ground and hearing the instructor assure my dad (who was terrified of all horses no matter what the size already) that I wasn't dead as I just twitched my leg.
Picked up, dusted off and sat back on the pony sobbing. Yet I was still happy to go back the next week....
 
Nope, no memory at all of the falls, must have hit the delete button at some point! Strong memory of some adult ones though because they hurt!
 
First time was off a pony named bilco. It was the first time in the field for me (this field was roughly twice the size of the arena so not massive but gave more space to trot or canter up the hill to the back of the ride) I was put on bilco because he was garunteed to not even get out of walk without a massive effort. It was my turn to go and off we walked then the horse behind didn’t want to wait so it took off full pelt taking ploddy old bilco along for the ride bucking and farting. I came off at the corner and right onto my arse. We had a “first fall” party at the yard haha. Second fall came in similar style on the same pony actually, but a year or two later and in the bigger field. Seems bilco liked to race with me. Fairly sure that last race killed him though...
 
A little chestnut section A. He was wet from the rain and part way through the lesson laid down to roll and I rolled off.
 
Yes, Holdenby riding school in the mid-90s. Riding my favourite little bay pony Bobby. Someone had left the jumps up in the indoor school and part way through our lesson Bobby decided to jump them for fun. I stayed on over the jump and fell off over the front left shoulder on landing. Morris the owner was so lovely to me. Always remember him telling me “remember, if anyone asks, you didn’t fall off, you were thrown!”
 
Sussexbythesea said:
My first fall was off my rocking horse Dapple. I even got my foot stuck in the stirrup, luckily Dapple stood still and waited for me to be rescued by my dad. He was a fabulous schoolmaster.

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Another one for a fall off a rocking horse, I hit my chin on a manhole cover in the garden and the doctor came out to put butterfly stitches on my chin. I still have the scar!
 
My fist fall was when I was around 9 years old, a couple of girls from the village were teaching me to ride their little pony, I vividly remember trotting along the grass verge then my next memory was waking up in hospital, the fall had knocked me clean out, didn't put me off though, then I loaned a little pony called Cody who wasn't very sure footed, he tripped a lot so I was forever falling off of him, one time I had a lovely new sheepskin numnah and was doing a warm up for Prince Philip games with my team, forgot to tighten my girth and as I leant over to throw the sock in the bucket me and the saddle slipped round depositing me on the floor!
 
Not sure about the first, but 2 stand out - about 10 years old, on an ‘own a pony’ day at the local riding school, my very first time riding outside of a school, but the rest of the group was far more confident & experienced than me. The instructor took about about 20 kids for a road hack and then across the stubble fields, and I got left behind on my fat piebald cob that I couldn’t get to trot. We get to the field, and the cob realises I’ve no modicum of control and sets off at a canter after the group. No one had checked any tack before leaving the yard - it turned out my reins were still twisted up in the throatlatch, and my girth was loose. Saddle slipped round and off I plopped our the side door. Instructor hadn’t noticed I was missing till the pony overtook the ride!

There was also a little menace of a pony named Polo that dropped his shoulder whenever you went into 2-point position. My first time over the worlds smallest cross pole ended with a face full of sand.
 
I remember it being at the local riding school. In the indoor arena. I dont remember what happened but I remember thinking "oh that wasnt as bad as I was expecting falling off to be"
 
I'm not counting the sliding off doing round the world. The first proper falling off was during a riding lesson in the indoor school when I was cantering confidently up to a jump which Max refused. The second and third times I fell off were also like that, but this time at a show on a different pony.
 
I cant remember my first fall but learning to ride for me was trial and error on a saint of a pony belonging to a friend who had lost interest, so I fell off a ridiculous number of times. Usually 2 or 3 times per ride, but it never bothered me, I was just thriled to have a pony to ride!
I can remember the first time I went to a local show, I dressed head to toe in my finest purple outfit, much to my surprise everyone else was wearing cream and tweed! I entered the clear round and fell off 5 or 6 times, pretty much after every single jump, but was happy to complete and I think by the third go I managed to only fall off once.
Its nice to think how much I have improved since then!

Edt: dear old Merlin and me in my finest purple outfit! 89435717_567995290736315_633145266819563520_n.jpg
 
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Yes, must have been 7ish and got bucked off a 4 year old little dun mare called Calico at the riding school and broke my arm. Instructor who could only have been about 16 tried to make me get back on but my mum heard the bone crack so whisked me off to hospital. When I took my nephew for lessons about 20 years later she was still there and was so tiny!
 
Between the age of 3 and 5 I think I toppled off with alarming regularity - but the first I vividly remember I was about 6 and put on a very cheeky grey pony called Blue. I knew she would buck a lot, but was assured by my Aunt that she would be absolutely fine on the lunge... She wasn't. A couple of bucks and farts later and I was straight out the side door.
 
My first fall was when I was a young teenager, on the approach to a jump that was significantly higher than anything I'd jumped before. I told the instructor I thought it was too much and she said to do it anyway. I tensed up and the horse refused the jump, throwing me forwards onto his neck as he slammed on the breaks. He had a last minute change of heart and leapfrogged the jump and I did a roly poly over his head into a nice pile of sand ? I did think that it wasn't as bad as I expected, purely because I hadn't hurt myself. Hopped back on but didn't try the jump again and I think I haven't jumped since... Yet! I've not long gotten back to riding after years away from it.
 
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