Ride On!

I had another great ride today. A good 3 hours of walk, running walk, rack and canter. My hip feels great. This is my third ride since the Doc cleared me for riding. Riding is a whole new experience without pain. I love to ride and always have, but it had become more difficult to enjoy the last few years. Endurance riding is my discipline of choice, and as you can imagine, requires many hours in the saddle, not only for the competitions, but also the conditioning. When my life aligned to allow me to persue endurance riding, my arthritis had progressed to the point where a 50 mile ride was out of the question. To spend 10 hours in the saddle would have been too painful. Most of the competions offer 25 or 30 mile rides, which is all I have completed up to this point. Completing a 50 mile ride has been a goal of mine for nearly 10 years. One I have yet to achieve. After todays ride, my 50 mile ride goal feels like something that could actually happen.
This is my second week of work, back to full duty. I have had my share of testing moments, especially the mini-donkey that wasn't impressed with having her mouth flushed and examined. 250lbs of pissed off. My hip is holding up fine, it's the rest of me that needs some time to adjust back to working a 40+ hour week.
I ended my physical therapy last week. I just couldn't see how I could fit it all in. I've continued to do many of the exercises at home. I still need to build up some strength. I can't rise from one knee using just my right leg, it is still just too weak. I'm fortunate it is my right leg, since I use my left leg to mount, getting up on my horse has not been a problem.
I'll soon need to put together my ride plan for the summer. I hadn't begun to seriously think about it until now, not knowing how things were going to turn out. I'm thinking a few LD's and maybe even a 50 this year. Ride On!