Saddlepad shopping

The other day I tried to use the saddle pad that came with my saddle, and Mara acted like she was being cut in half by the saddle. "I can't move" she said as she stumbled about.

She is in heat, but as an experiment, I switched the pad for my newish sheepskin one. She was immediately better. (The words of KT came back to me - "Always use your wool pad - when you don't, your horse doesn't want to move properly." OK then. But agh, I love the WHITE....)

Great. I have to order another wool pad because I can't just have one pad, it takes 4 days to dry when I wash it.

A friend told me today, "Some horses become dependent on wool - I don't want to go there."

Later I read, "Some sensitive horses absolutely require sheepskin."

That must be Mara.

I went shopping. Ridingwarehouse has a lovely woolback - black with white fluff edging called the Toklat Matrix. Used by endurance team Reynolds, they wrote a nice review and I was dismayed when I saw that it's not available in Germany.

And although I've been a loyal Skito user, I've come to appreciate actual lambskin (with leather backing) - the real deal.

I got all excited when I found the Christ Champ treeless model for only 120E. Ohhhh, such fine workmanship, such fine wool.....the Cadillac of wool pads, well, Christ and Mattes both.

While shopping I almost missed this - huh? Barefoot manufactured a pad specifically for my donkey?

Anyway, I fell for my saddle not only cuz of the comfort, but because of the lovely V shape flap. It's a minimalist dream of a saddle, and I want that V shape to be accentuated by a pad, not hidden. The Supracors, Hafs, my current woolpad, they hide the shape of a Eurolite. This is what I love about Skito. They ask you what model saddle you have, and customize every pad to fit precisely.

I was always annoyed when someone entered a horse show with a sparkling white fitted pad, but the pad didn't conform to the shape of the saddle. Is it George Morris who got me started thinking this way? Was he right, or am I nuts. Hrm. Wait, I know the answer.

In my search today I wanted to find a company like Skito, who would tailor a pad to fit a saddle precisely. Hmmm..

Mattes. You know, the Balkenhols' sponsor. The masters of wool everything - they registered the domain "sheepskin.net" (in German). Now what have we here....

Some sort of javascript tool for creating your own saddle pad, every detail.

Here is what I came up with. I have a fondness for white, and black and white together. It reflects my dressage past.




Even though it's not exactly the shape of my saddle, it's so elegant. And black wool! And you can get it monogrammed of course. Go there and try it just for fun, the German isn't so hard, it's mostly a graphical interface.

I would buy this.......but it's 309E (388$)! : (

OK it must be possible to meet my questionably sane needs for less than 200E.

Think. Remember. I only paid 100, I think, for the wool pad I have now from Engel Reitsport, and they customized it for me in some ways. Would they customize....the shape?

I got an email almost immediately. "Tell us what you need and draw up a template."

YES. Although they are not as high quality as Mattes and Christ, they are close enough for me. And check out this special they're having on English/Dressage pads (scroll down for images).

I've only had my Engel sheepskin pad for 7 months, but so far so good, and it came out of the washer looking brand new (well, after drying for 4 days on a rack).

And apparently my horse likes them.

Requires them.