Valerie Riabko

This saddle’s goal is to make horses a Happy Athlete.

Developed on horses with well-being in mind, thanks to specially designed measuring methods, shape and materials. Happy Athlete is a performance-based jumping saddle, which guarantees a better range of movement and a more natural skin-like contact. 

Happy Athlete is a saddle developed closely in collaboration with veterinarians, saddle fitters and European professional horse riders. The collaborations with experts helped me to identify the main problems in existing saddle trees.

Happy Athlete is based on a new saddle tree, which I developed specially for show jumping horses. The saddle tree was developed in a minimum material waste environment, and a maximum manufacturing time efficiency process. The technology used in the saddle tree makes it one of the most technically advanced available on the market, and it is novel to the equestrian industry.

Combining high-tech materials and innovative technology allowed me to develop a flexible saddle tree in areas where it is needed, and rigid in areas where more support is required. This technology guarantees that all saddle trees are exactly the same, reducing any margin of error and vastly reducing its weight. The saddle tree has undergone expert examination and was tested on users, including recreational horse riders and a member of the Polish National Team in Show Jumping. 

Happy Athlete has a more anatomical shape, giving a larger range of movement, comfort to the rider, and to the horse. The new two-point girth system offers more versatility in girthing and saddle positioning. Designed using durable by nature, resistant to damage soft calf leather.