Thread to reminisce about pre health and safety/designer riding wear days

I'm not entirely sure I follow modern health & safety that closely. Admittedly use hats, hi viz etc, but my daughters been brought up riding bareback a lot & has a pony pad on her pony currently. I still have my nagragz saddlecloth, with the colour scheme I chose & daughter always uses it on mine when she rides her. Think she'd have it on her pony if it fitted.
 
My mum has pictures of her riding in a really ugly white skull cap!
she said it was one of the first ones and she had to buy a cover for it because it was so hideous! tehe!
 
How about this - chin strap on hat, no body protector, string gloves, string girth, THOSE boots, no boots/bandages and a pony tail (now banned by PC) and no medical armband. Those were the days circa 1975

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Double_choc_lab said:
How about this - chin strap on hat, no body protector, string gloves, string girth, THOSE boots, no boots/bandages and a pony tail (now banned by PC) and no medical armband. Those were the days circa 1975
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What are "THOSE" boots? :confused: And what's wrong with a pony tail (I assume you mean on the rider, not the pony :D)?
 
I'm sure most of these will have been said already, but these are the things I remember best...

The sheer amazement when I was given a skull cap for a christmas present and it had a rubber chin cup on it. I remember nibbling on it whilst riding too :rolleyes:

When I first learnt to ride, I had a metre ruler put down my jodpurs so that I learnt to sit up straight - it worked! :eek:

Riding just about anywhere bareback, rarely in walk either :)

Hoofpicks without the brushes on the end!

Falling off and getting laughed at by the instructor. Perhaps one of my favourite memories is when the entire ride fell of at the same time because said instructor roared so loudly at a fellow rider for her heels pointing up that it spooked all of the ponies.

Riding in the horsebox with the horse if it was nervous.

Going for hacks with friends way before the age of 18.

Laps of honour were not done in canter, they were done in gallop. The faster the better.
 
Hells Bells said:
The sheer amazement when I was given a skull cap for a christmas present and it had a rubber chin cup on it. I remember nibbling on it whilst riding too :rolleyes:
r.
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Hahahaha..I remember doing that to my chin strap.

And remember when we used to go off for a hack without hi viz or mobile phone and just tell mum we'd be back later.

Remember those long rubber boots too. so tight to get off someone had to brace you at the knee while you leant backwards.

Remember when Gallop was the only horse shampoo

Remember white cavaletti that you could roll over to three different heights
 
Gosh....... this is taking me back, love these reminiscence threads.

I remember the days when the ONLY horses out hunting were either chestnut, bay, or grey. Definately NO coloured horses!

Ditto Pony Club rallies.

The only bits you saw on a horse/pony were a snaffle, or possibly a Kimblewick or a Pelham, or a double bridle. Nothing else. And most bits and stirrup irons were made of nickel - horrible stuff to clean.

Bridles were leather, leather, or leather, and only one colour at that, the regulation "tan" which if you wanted to get darker you had to oil like crazy. If you fancied it you could get the dragon-tooth-patterned plastic browbands in whatever colour you fancied, with matching nylon girths and nylon reins. Mine were bright blue.

There wasn't the selection of rugs we've got now: then if yours lived out it was a New Zealand rug, which weighed a ton, and if in, it was jute rugs with rollers and blankets.

Saddles were mainly rigid tree; and if you were unlucky you had one with a serge lining not leather. Spring tree saddles were expensive and mainly for showjumping/eventing. Our poor old Pony Club DC would have had a seizure, bless her, if she'd ever thought we'd all be riding around on plastic saddles and with plastic bridles!!!

If you wanted to buy riding gear, tack shops were few and far between and you paid through the nose (still do!!!). OR you could get the Jacatex catalogue - I remember my mum buying me their "lovat herringtooth" hacking jacket and riding trousers which lasted for years!!! No wonder they went out of business, their stuff was just too good!

A set of shoes cost less than £20 (OK so I AM showing my age here! :) )

If you fell off at a pony club rally/XC event, whatever: you were just shovelled up and stuck back on top, no ifs or buts.

We thought nothing of hacking 8 miles to a show/rally/hunting, doing the day, and then hacking back again at the end. Our horses were super fit.

You could go out on the roads for a hack without getting mown down by mega-juggernauts, boy racers, quad bikes, and tribes of cyclists!

They were good days; a lot more work maybe, but heh we had fun.
 
patterdale said:
Haven't you heard? If you fall off the pony will stand on it and somehow scalp you!

That's what one of the other instructors at a PC I teach at says anyway...
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Haha! Really? I always tie my hair back in a pony tail, though in my youth I wore hair nets. Do people still use those?

I'm still puzzled by the "THOSE" boots comment though. Someone enlighten me please!
 
not only that Double_Choc_lab - I doubt you would even be allowed to jump that jump anymore!!!

I remember being allowed to hack out alone for hours, to meet up with friends 3miles away to hoon about for a few hours then poddle home - No Bridleways needed, just nipped along field edges!
 
Plastic coloured browbands

rode in a rope halter bareback and jumped!

musical hats yes your hat got taken off and put on a pole

saddle bought to fit you the horse didn't get a look in

pony stalls, tied up all night with a weight through the end of the rope, so easy to muck out though!!!

'posh' feed was Spillers pony cubes, or you fed straights (if you couldn't be bothered to walk to the local shop which actually had 'microwave' to heat pies you would eat pony nuts yourself to keep going)

at the age of 9 it wa s safe to hack on your own

if pony refused to load after the show you rode it home along the A48!

if kept out in winter you rode only at the weekend brushed where tack went let the rest caked in mud

New Zealand rugs that constantly leaked and weighed a ton

you would walk miles alone as a child to get to your pony often carrying feed or tack.

Hay making, the whole yard joined in riding back on the top of trailer stacked high with hay, as it got dark farmers wife would supply warm Welsh Cakes and cold cider to anyone of any age

those were the days:) very happy memories
 
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Cork hat with elastic - check
Whip with metal end - check
Cagoul (makes you sweat and isn't waterproof) - check
Rubber boots (needs an assistant to remove them) - check
Beige jods - check (and I know what you're thinking ;)

circa 1972 :D

Or even better

Before the word safety was even invented

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I remember going to shows, obviously we all went but only the rider and the lorry driver got in without a ticket, we all used to travel in the back, and climb up so the gatekeeper would look though the sides of the lorry but see no legs.
We used to move Clydesdales from their winter grazing to their farms for spring ploughing [!] by cantering them alongside the canal with a rope halter.
I rode the starter's horse up to Hamilton Racecourse, currently Baillieston interchange on the M8.
 
Horse and Hound was a Black and White newspaper, with all classified ads on the front, it was also the only place to find jobs, the sort of jobs we had no real idea what they meant: stud groom, stallion man, under groom, fleshman, whipper-in, under whipper-in, amateur jockey, amateur huntsman, orraman, kennelman.
There were notices of upcoming sales and shows, but I don't recall any articles!
 
I remember when a set of shoes cost £6.40, but New Zealand rugs were something like £30 - I had a New Zealand Rug for Christmas once, along with a Pelham to go hunting in, and a Numnah as well.

I was riding in a hat with a chinguard thing till last year.... oops!

Concussion was something most people had a a few times out horse riding in the 70s.

I can remember when "horse and pony mix" first came on the market and it was marvellous! we used to buy an extra bag of oats and pop in a mugful the night before a gymkhana (but not before hunting - we would give them boiled barley then to make them look fatter as they lived out and got thin in the winter).

Up until the late 70s, only really posh people rugged their horses (that's how it seemed to me anyway).

I remember wearing flared jeans to go riding in and having to wrap them round my leg to get them inside the rubber riding boots I had.

Nobody ever served samosas or anything like that at hunt meets - it was just punch if I remember rightly.
 
Waffles said:
Nobody ever served samosas or anything like that at hunt meets - it was just punch if I remember rightly.
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I find it difficult to believe anyone would hand out samosas, it hardly goes with port and brandy!
We had a job looking elegant and in control, with a full glass [real glasses] of port and brandy in one hand and a double bridle in the other.
I had a pair of those tartan trousers, they were woollen, ultra baggy, also itched quite a lot.
 
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I always caught my horses (including an ex racehorse) with no head collar, managed to vault on and would flat out gallop up the field up to the gate. I used to think that was dead cool.

I used to leap frog onto my pony's back over his bum when he was tied up to a post - I had to surprise him as he used to kick otherwise.

And, oh yes - that cough mixture for horses that came in a squat cylindrical tub with a screw top and smelt lovely - aniseed I think it was - a guy at the farm I was at had some when he had a cold (it was firm stuff you had to roll into a ball and put into the horse's mouth) - anyway the guy said he sweated profusely for about 4 hours but was miraculously cured.
 
Miss L Toe said:
I find it difficult to believe anyone would hand out samosas, it hardly goes with port and brandy!
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I went to a hunt in about 1995 or 6 and they had samosas there - I must admit, I did think it was a bit weird. Plus, my horse embarrassed me by licking spilt punch off all the trays people were carrying round - he followed them everywhere, but luckily they thought it was cute.
 
I remember the mainly beige jods,Jacatex gear,and all of the clothes had no elasticity so it was hard to move around nimbly.We had string gloves,plain colours apart from the webbing reins which came in an assortment of colours.Old fashioned NZ rugs and jute and Lavenham stable rugs which got quite disgusting.We also hacked miles to shows,competed all day then hacked back,often at a much faster pace.My friends and i went out all day on our ponies and the parents had no idea where we were.Another thing is nobody had arenas,but we still managed with the use of a marked out area in the field.We rode and jumped bareback,vaulted onto the ponies and did everything outside the health and saferty rule book bar riding without a hat.We had fun.
 
I've just fallen into a time warp, but Wundahorse, your last words say it all - we had FUN! :D:D

Nobody's mentioned making a hot bran mash in a hay box...;)
 
Bringing up a flask of hot water to mix into the feed when it was really cold out.


Giving a small bottle of mackeson or guinness as a treat mixed into a feed.
 
RE horse colours... to me, horses are usually "Brown, white or black" as I'm usually talking to none horsey people :P If I say Ned is bright bay, I get questioning looks. Just so much easier to say he's brown.

I loved the chinstrap hats too, and I also nibbled them :P

When I started riding, I think we were just about to come into the H&S age, but I did learn to ride on some nutty ponies. One of which liked to throw herself in front of tractors, she bucked when she got told off (not whipped, verbally told off!) tanked off at the slightest excuse and wouldn't hack out alone. Some how I never fell off her and hacked her out (with my mum walking with me...times haven't changed much) I think we just got on with it as kids.
 
sleepykitten said:
Jodhpurs that had a seam all the way round the back of your knee and cut in - and they only came in black, navy or beige.

Oh I remember that seam that cut into the back of the knee!

I remember when "Muckers" first came on the market and EVERYONE got a pair for their birthdays. :D (including me!)
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Those loveson Rustlers were so hip!!.
 
Anyone remember the old manual of horsemanship the pony club used to have. blue and white hard back?

Yes, I remember the cork hat with the elastic chin strap that you had to tie a knot is as the elastic stretched over time.

Also do you remember when none of our ponies wore boots to go hacking?
 
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