How to Achieve Straightness with Tanisha Ryan

No matter who you are or what discipline you do, chances are you’ve come across the problem of straightness. It’s a pesky problem that can really frustrate even the most patient riders, especially when it proves to be an issue that evolves and changes direction every time you feel like you’ve solved it.

First of all: what is straightness?

According to the FEI database: “The horse is straight when its forehand is in line with its hindquarters, that is, when the longitudinal axis is in line with the straight or curved track it is following.”

In simpler terms, straightness can be achieved when a horse is travelling like a train on train tracks: the cab (front of the train), leads all the subsequent carriages on those two tracks and this stays the same no matter what direction the train is going, including curved lines.

To the rider, straightness has two separate feelings. Straight into both reins and straight through the body. When a horse is straight into both reins, there is even weight travelling into the rider’s hands and the rider is able to ask for the horse to change its flexion with ease to both sides. Straight through the body refers to the feeling the rider gets under the saddle and through the leg. This is where the horse’s body feels truly even under the rider’s seat bones and there is no extra weight/ pressure on one of the rider’s legs where the horse is bulging out or falling.

Sounds simple, right?

As you might expect, it is very much not simple.

Naturally, horses are not designed to travel straight and will always be more crooked to one side and be stronger in one direction. Similar to us as people, horses have dominant sides that they will want to favour.

The real question for us is, how can we help solve this?

Tips to Improve Straightness

Depending on what discipline you do and how advanced your horse is, there are many different ways to improve and influence straightness but there are some simple exercises that can benefit any horse regardless of their skill level and should be employed often in the horse’s training.

Exercise 1: Changing the Flexion

Flexion refers to where the horse’s head is pointing. This is not the same as bending. Flexion comes from the hand, bend comes from the leg.

Starting on a straight line, ask your horse to look slightly to the outside of the arena by squeezing on your outside rein. You’re aiming for them to be able to easily turn their head without them trying to turn, fall over or wobble. Once you’ve achieved counter-flexion (pointing the horse’s nose to the outside of the arena), then ask your horse to look to the inside of the arena by squeezing on your inside rein. Once again, you’re aiming for them to bring their nose slightly to the inside (until you can see their inside eye) without changing anything else in their body.

Though this is a very simple exercise, I can guarantee you’ll find it trickier than it sounds. As your horse improves, try doing this anywhere and everywhere in the arena including on circles, straight lines and changes of direction as well as in all paces.

Exercise 2: Changing Direction

Changing direction is something that we regularly employ to make sure we’re working both sides of the horse’s body but what does this have to do with straightness?

Straightness comes from both sides of the horse’s body working equally and the best way to ensure this is by making sure the horse’s body is bending equally through both sides of its body when changing direction which will allow them to travel straight on both curved and straight lines.

What is bend: Bend refers to how the horse’s body and rib cage curve around the rider’s leg.

Starting on a figure of eight, head towards the apex of the figure of eight, where the change of direction comes into play and practice applying your new inside leg as you begin the next part of the figure of eight, asking for your horse’s body to curve around the leg that you’re applying. You can assist them by asking for new flexion (bringing their nose to the inside of the circle) to help them find your inside leg and bend their rib cage.

You’ll find that they naturally want to bend one way more than the other and that’s where they are becoming crooked. Continue this exercise and implement it in all paces, and you can begin to increase the difficulty by making the turns sharper by using ten metre circles, spiraling the circle larger and smaller or doing multiple figure eights in a row.

Ultimately, straightness is a never-ending journey that we undertake as riders and though it can be tricky to improve and spot, no matter your skill level, every rider experiences difficulties in these areas, even the most advanced riders across every equestrian discipline!

As always, be kind to yourself and your horse in the training process and when in doubt, stop and breathe before continuing. It is natural to struggle and the most important thing you can do for yourself, and your horse, is to know when to ask for help or assistance.

Good luck and enjoy the training journey!