This article is about bareback horse riding. For the rodeo event, see Bareback Bronc Riding.
Riding bareback can be therapeutic and fun, but it requires skill and balance to ride well without a saddle. To learn to ride bareback, one must be able to either ride well before hand with a saddle but without stirrups, or start out slow. Confidence and determination is needed to skillfully learn to ride bareback. Without confidence, the fastest one will ever go is at a trot. To be able to ride bareback as comfortably as with a saddle may be challenging, but the end result is greatly rewarding.
It is important when first learning to ride bareback to not squeeze your legs to keep balanced as it will make your horse go faster. One also should not constantly pull on the reins when riding, and especially not squeeze your legs and pull the reins to slow the horse as it will eventually make your horse unresponsive and hard to stop. If one starts to lose his balance, holding the mane will help (it will not hurt the horse).
