How long will you keep jumping with your horse between your legs? What is the stick horse, this funny spo

In Paulinet, Tarn, a unique form of horseback riding is practiced where the horse is replaced by a wooden stick adorned with a foam head. Welcome to “hobbyhorse,” an unusual sport gaining popularity on social media! Here’s everything you need to know about this demanding discipline that is gaining structure across France.

Every other Saturday afternoon in the quiet hamlet of Notre-Dame-d’Ourtiguet in Paulinet, Tarn, the calm is disturbed by the rhythm of trotting and jumping. Eight young girls practice obstacle courses in a slightly different way: a horse head fixed on a stick accompanies them in their movements.

Since last year, the village has been home to the only “Hobby Horse” association in France, a discipline from Finland that may initially raise a few smiles. Jumps, dressage – the discipline borrows everything from horseback riding with one detail: the mount is not flesh and blood but foam and wood. “It really is a sport,” insists Lilou Rigal, the young president of the “Hobby trotters des Monts d’Alban.”

Precision, coordination, memory She discovered Hobby Horse through social media in 2020. “I started alone in my garden,” she recounts. After practicing for five years on her own, a question from her grandmother became decisive. “I asked her until when she was going to jump with her horse between her legs,” smiles Ginette, the association’s treasurer. At 13, assisted by her mother and grandmother, she took the plunge and created the structure.

From two practitioners, the association now has eight young “hobby trotters.” “It’s starting to spread,” notes Nathalie Rigal, the association’s mother and secretary. They have received calls in the past few days from girls in Albi, Labastide-Gabausse, and even Tarbes for training.

“This Saturday, under the watchful eye of Didier Assier, Camille’s father, one of the young trotters, the little group practices. “We had to get into it,” he smiles. Leg placement on jumps, momentum – “it’s a sport that can be traumatic with the landings of the jumps,” he explains. They can jump up to 1.30 m. It also requires a lot of coordination and memorization work to know the course well,” adds Lilou.

“Next year, we continue” affirms the family board of the association. They hope the discipline will achieve official sports status, either being affiliated with the French Equestrian Federation or creating its own structure.