As Laura mentioned, John has a couple Free’n’Easy
Saddles.Remington has a customized
saddle as he is very much not a normally shaped horse – and not typical to
Icelandics either.Most Icelandics
I have fit have been broad and low withered (which is one reason Free’n’Easy
has been popular with them because they provide so much lateral stability).Remington was fitted with a medium tree
whereas most Icelandic have been wide or extra
wide.But from there, we had to
make further modifications because of the shape of his back.He does NOT have well sprung ribs!A tracing of his mid back looks more like
a wither tracing so his saddle has custom blocks to specifically allow the back
of the panels to follow his motion at his angle.
He does have a typically short back and one thing that
allows the Free’n’Easy to work for both a short back and the well
muscled and highly rotated shoulders seen in many gaited horses is the ability
to specifically allow the panels to follow the curvature of the entire and even
create a little more flare as needed over the shoulders.
While I no longer own Moss Rock Endurance (the US FnE distributor), I am still very impressed with the shape
and motion that the Free’n’Easy can work with.It was interesting working with John and
Remington and hopefully someday I’ll get to meet Remington in person!
