Bio Mechanics

Story and Photos

By Stephanie Fish-Crossman

In this issue, we are going to work on some small changes that will make a BIG difference in ge�ng your horse on the bit!

Our volunteer for this review is Wilma, a lovely lady that I met while doing a clinic in the New Smyrna area. Wilma has been riding for around 13 years, starting as an adult in the hunter world and switching eventually to dressage. She and her horse Kyon have been together for 3 years, with his previous training being mainly in the dressage world as well. She works as a Title Agent, so sits a lot at work looking at a computer, and has no major previous injuries. Welcome, Wilma and Kyon!

BEFORE

It may suffice for a while, but it will make it harder for her to accomplish things like collec�on and lateral work.

Let’s start the fix!

Star�ng with the thigh, we rotated the thigh in and pulled the hamstrings out of the way of the femur, so that it could

After

In our first picture, Wilma looks safe and confident, and I feel that she is breathing enough to not have to address it. When you glance at this photo it really looks quite nice, what you would commonly see in the Dressage world, but the more you look at it the more you can see that some changes need to be made. For a change, let’s start with the horse – even at the halt, you can see that Kyon’s back is down, and his ears are back in a notnecessarily-happy manner. This body posi�oning, whether it is caused by Wilma or whether she is a by-product of it, makes it difficult for the horse to move over his back, reach for the bit and have a consistent connec�on. That, in turn, makes it difficult for Wilma to do with ease the things she wants to do –steer, make nice corners or lengthenings, and generally remain in a consistent rhythm. Can we help them? Yes we can!

Going to Wilma, you can see that her shoulder-hip-ankle line up is slightly �lted backwards; always remember that my goal is to line my riders up in such a way that if I were to magically pull the horse out from underneath them, they would land on their feet. In our first picture it is clear that Wilma would land on her bu�, as her feet are in front of her, her ankle is locked down and her knee is too open. While Wilma is si�ng upright, her lack of ability to balance through her lower joints has created an engagement imbalance in her front and back of her torso, so that her guts are not engaged and her front lines are not suppor�ng her back lines. Think of it this way: I am dividing Wilma into two parts, a front and a back half. I am then filling her with beans, so that she is a bean-bag Wilma. Looking at our first picture, where would you say Wilma is carrying the majority of her beans? If you said in the back, you’ve got a good eye! By not engaging the front of her seat – meaning her quads and adductors in her thighs, and her core muscles up the front of her torso – Wilma is essen�ally riding only off the strength of her backside, which is one dimensional. This overreliance on her back lines gives her no assistance in ge�ng out of the hole in the horse’s back, and will cause her to have to resort to the reins to try to get him to lower his neck.

Let’s go back to the first picture for a moment. We know that the horse is standing in this photo, but look at the reins. While they are loose and not disturbing the horse, if you had to describe the direc�on of the energy running through the reins, would you say the energy is pushing from Wilma to the bit, or is Wilma pulling the reins to her from the bit? It is subtle, for sure, but I see that the direc�ons of the energy in the reins is going toward Wilma, not toward the bit. Once in mo�on, this will be a catch-22 problem – because the energy is going to Wilma, she will be pulling the horse’s head to her, causing the back to go down, which in turn causes her to fall more into the hole of his back, which keeps that cycle going. Conversely, if the horse is used to going with his back down, he will be shorter in the topline of his neck, causing there to be a space between her hand and the rein, which will encourage Wilma to shorten her reins to try to find him, while she is also trying lay closer to the saddle. I brought her heel back under her more through the use of isometric resistances, which help Wilma to note her muscle discrepancies and strengthen them through a series of exercises. You can see in the second picture that her foot is more underneath her body and her ankle looks less jammed in the s�rrup. There is a greater bend at the back of her knee, and if you compare the pictures closely, you can see that the seam of her pants is closer to the thigh block. These are all signs that Wilma is ac�va�ng all 4 parts of her thighs to ride in her muscles, while allowing her joints to flex and bend so�ly, rather than bracing into her joints as she was in the first picture. This is some deep work, and takes a lot of concentra�on!

Can you see the difference in the direction of the energy going down the reins?

Trailers 2023

Before

to get out of the hole in his back. See what I mean about a catch-22?

The fix for this issue starts in the thighs, which we have already looked at, and crea�ng a more solid base for Wilma to work from. Once stabilized below the belt, we worked on Wilma ge�ng more familiar with her whole core – how she breathes in her body, where she can and cannot engage muscles, and how to access those areas that her brain had forgo�en were a�ached I feel that one of the biggest things I can do as a coach is help people reengage their bodies and their brains – propriocep�on can really lie to you! By pu�ng my hands on Wilma, I gave her an idea of where she should find herself posi�onally in the saddle, and then we experimented with ways to help her engage those core muscles in front that forgot they had a duty. Using various sounds, breathing techniques and simply poking around, we were able to get Wilma more engaged in the front of her, which allowed her backside to release some of its weight and helped her be more centrally located in the saddle. Take a look at her arms, and compare from the first picture to the second – can you see the difference in the direc�on of the energy going down the reins? In the second picture it is clear to me that Wilma is pushing the energy from her body to the bit. Let’s no�ce the different stance of the horse as well – he is less hollow, and more stretching across his topline, even in the halt!

Great work Wilma – your homework consists of con�nuing to work on u�lizing the muscles all around your thighs to get be�er a�ached, which will lead to you being able to influence your horse to bring his back up under you more and more. Remember to keep your beans more evenly distributed in the front and the back of your body, through breathing exercises, core engagement and simply staying aware of your body as you do the fun stuff you love to do with your horse!

Ques�ons? Comments? Would you like to have a rider biomechanics assessment yourself? Whether you would like to be featured as one of our magazine riders or simply for yourself, feel free to contact me at stephany@serendipitydressage.net. Thanks to the staff at Elite Equestrian for featuring us, we look forward to sharing more informa�on with you next ar�cle!