Short arms + long horse neck = reins too long

[mydogs]

Does anyone else have short arms, because they short in height, ride a horse with a long neck, also have issues with keeping elbows at your side and/or riding with reins that are too long? I can do it if I really focus on it, but I feel very mentally uncomfortable at times.

When I ride smaller horses, I feel as though I struggle less with keeping my elbows bent and at my side. I believe it is a mental thing for me but haven’t been able to pinpoint exactly why. Hoping to see if I am alone in this or if someone can provide a mental lightbulb for me.

[Texarkana]

Yes! I ride the equine equivalent of a Buick and I feel like a t-rex. My lessons are a constant, “bend your elbows, now shorten your reins, bend you elbows again, now push your hands forward and get them out of your lap, but bend your elbows and shorten your reins…” :lol:

I get the same sort of mental frustration. This is probably the worst advice ever, but I kind of tune it out lately and instead focus on keeping flexibility in my elbows, my hands still, and steady contact. I figure the connection is more important than trying to find the sweet spot that makes me look perfect. I’m not built like your ideal rider and there’s nothing I can do about that except try to find a way to best use the physique that I have.

[BigMama1]

Welcome to my world! I’ve just had to learn that in order to keep my elbows at my side and my hands down and still, my reins need to be a tad longer than I’d like them

[mydogs]

Oh good! So it isn’t just me, that actually makes me feel a lot better.

[Scribbler]

I think most riders have trouble with this, judging from the pinnochio arms I see all around me.

What finally fixed me was trying to ride my horse through spring grass in a bitless bridle. Unless I kept my elbows at my sides and carried my hands, she would dive for the grass.

Pinnochio arms and shorter reins didn’t give nearly the control of bent elbows, carried hands and longer reins.

I absolutely remember feeling like my reins were too long all the time and I no longer feel that. Not sure whether it was me or the horse that changed.

But you need to make the effort to ride with correct elbows because pinnochio arms are often also pulling down, and in any case they limit how much your hand can give.

[outerbanks77]

This makes sense to me. A horse with a longer neck needs more of a “give” forward, which will be harder with proportionally shorter arms. I’m not sure there is a way around it other than to learn to walk your fingers up the reins to keep shortening them after a give/stretch.

[Scribbler]

If you need to give the reins you can carry the hands forward without losing all the bend in the elbow. The elbow comes forward from your side but your arms don’t become straight.

Once you have straight arms as your regular riding positicsn you can’t give the reins at all. Also the horse can pull you out of the saddle more easily.

[netg]

So you need to keep your elbows at your side when not giving, or you have nowhere to give. You simply can’t have hands over the middle of your horse’s neck when you’re built like a t-rex. We also tend to have a bad habit of straightening arms down which pulls on the bars of the mouth and removes ability to give. Bad habit, and it’s hard to fetch rid of! For an example, see my canter pic. My other pics show trot with upper arms at my side, and allowing forward on the closest my mare could get to a medium that particular day with reins the same length. If your reins are the right length but getting slack, it means you have to push the horse up into contact from behind… obviously easier said than done. Even Charlotte no longer rides with the straight arms she used to ride with!

[ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“none”,“data-size”:“medium”,“data-attachmentid”:10204456}[/ATTACH][ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“none”,“data-size”:“medium”,“data-attachmentid”:10204457}[/ATTACH][ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“none”,“data-size”:“medium”,“data-attachmentid”:10204458}[/ATTACH]

[alibi_18]

@Texarkana

I get the same sort of mental frustration. This is probably the worst advice ever, but I kind of tune it out lately and instead focus on keeping flexibility in my elbows, my hands still, and steady contact. I figure the connection is more important than trying to find the sweet spot that makes me look perfect. I’m not built like your ideal rider and there’s nothing I can do about that except try to find a way to best use the physique that I have.

It has nothing to do with the look but the effectiveness.

As a rider, you need to work in front of you. (*general you, not you in particular) with reins short enough to receive the contact.
The more the horse collects, the shorter the reins will get and will be. You need to set the reins at the lenght you want the horse to carry itself.

If you start with too long reins, when the horse reach contact and rounds itself, the contact will be off on loopy reins… unable to keep a stable contact thus unable to give correct signals. And that’s when the rider starts to work on his laps to get the contact back, working front to back.

Work in front of you.
Short reins, enough for you to keep hands in front of you.

[Texarkana]

@alibi_18

It has nothing to do with the look but the effectiveness.

As a rider, you need to work in front of you. (*general you, not you in particular) with reins short enough to receive the contact.
The more the horse collects, the shorter the reins will get and will be. You need to set the reins at the lenght you want the horse to carry itself.

If you start with too long reins, when the horse reach contact and rounds itself, the contact will be off on loopy reins… unable to keep a stable contact thus unable to give correct signals. And that’s when the rider starts to work on his laps to get the contact back, working front to back.

Work in front of you.
Short reins, enough for you to keep hands in front of you.

Yes, I understand this. But when your arms are <—> yay long, there is a fine line between pushing your arms out in front of you and locking your elbows.

[alibi_18]

@Texarkana

Yes, I understand this. But when your arms are <—> yay long, there is a fine line between pushing your arms out in front of you and locking your elbows.

I agree with you about focusing on keeping a steady contact

I’m on the short side of the 1/1 ratio arm spread/heigth.
Unless you have a real physical difformity, it’s not about a particular arm length.

To me, as a rider and trainer, it’s just another phase.
Everyone feel their arms are too short and complain, until it clic! and they are able to do it. It is just core strength and balance.

It’s like carrying a big plate with a cake or pushing a cart. No one locks their elbows for that, no one have their hands down at their crotch… everyone can do it.
That’s the reason why the Equicube is usefull for that problem, it makes you carry something

While riding, or carrying a cake, if you are locking your elbows, your arms are either not at your side or are too low on each side of your lap.

Do you lunge with your arm stretched out and locked?

[MysticOakRanch]

OMG, I am a freaking Quarterhorse - long hind leg, short foreleg, hahahaha… I would be SO downhill on all 4s. Yes, and one thing that a well known FEI judge and clinician told me is - for my conformation, I should focus LESS on bending my elbows, and MORE on maintaining a good (GOOD, as in reins short enough, hand giving enough, but not too much) contact, even if that means my arm becomes straighter. That really has helped me - it is kind of a mental thing…

[Willesdon]

OP oh yes, I understand your problems! I have found that thinking of open shoulders, neck into my shirt collar, reins coming from my shoulderblades all help. But the biggest thing is that I have recently been riding with an excellent trainer who sees how the horse goes rather than just the length of my reins. She very rarely nags about that, she often comments on my good rythmn. That stops me stressing about shorter rein length and makes me think about the horse moving forward off my leg. Then my arms don’t feel short anymore: horse and I come to a happy agreement.

[Scribbler]

@Willesdon

OP oh yes, I understand your problems! I have found that thinking of open shoulders, neck into my shirt collar, reins coming from my shoulderblades all help. But the biggest thing is that I have recently been riding with an excellent trainer who sees how the horse goes rather than just the length of my reins. She very rarely nags about that, she often comments on my good rythmn. That stops me stressing about shorter rein length and makes me think about the horse moving forward off my leg. Then my arms don’t feel short anymore: horse and I come to a happy agreement.

Yes, as with leg position and other aspects of rider position, elbows is one of those things that you need to keep working on (or else you will get locked in a bad position) but that won’t become natural until other aspects of contact, core strength, posture, are solid. Focusing on function is more useful than nagging.

That said, I see a lot of riders in both jump seat and dressage getting stuck with pinnochio arms. For jump seat it seems associated with tipping forward and with dressage, water skiing on the reins: leaning back and balancing on the reins.

​​​​​​Its harder to balance on the reins if your elbows are bent. And it’s hard to keep your elbows bent if you are leaning back.

[Equibrit]

Maybe - horses with longer necks drop their heads lower ?

[mydogs]

I had an epiphany tonight about this.
I don’t have a problem keeping my elbows at my side when riding smaller horses because otherwise, my hands would be towards the middle of their necks. I realized that the reason why I don’t mentally feel comfortable with my elbows at my side on larger/taller horses is that my reins look so long that I actually think to myself, “if my horse spooked or took off, my reins would be too long to have any control”.

[Scribbler]

@mydogs

I had an epiphany tonight about this.
I don’t have a problem keeping my elbows at my side when riding smaller horses because otherwise, my hands would be towards the middle of their necks. I realized that the reason why I don’t mentally feel comfortable with my elbows at my side on larger/taller horses is that my reins look so long that I actually think to myself, “if my horse spooked or took off, my reins would be too long to have any control”.

Actually I think you have more control. Your hands can go up or spread for emergency control, more effective than pulling back. That is if you are sitting up straight with your leg dropped.

Another piece of the puzzle is, can you keep a grip on the reins or do they slide through your hands and get long?

[emipou]

Just wanted to be clear here - long-armed people feel this way as well. I think it’s just the nature of the long-necked horse.

One of the things I was really working on developing with my guy we retired recently was how to ask for that contact, then release so that my arms weren’t thrown forward all the time, and I wasn’t constantly tugging at the bit. It was tricky though.

[mvp]

@outerbanks77

This makes sense to me. A horse with a longer neck needs more of a “give” forward, which will be harder with proportionally shorter arms. I’m not sure there is a way around it other than to learn to walk your fingers up the reins to keep shortening them after a give/stretch.

The problem is that it takes more core strength to ride with short arms on a long neck. Imagine holding a tray with a heavy cake on it-- do you want that close to your body, or out and far ahead of you, while you stay soft in you elbows. Feel that in your own body; that’s the problem right there.

[mydogs]

@mvp

The problem is that it takes more core strength to ride with short arms on a long neck. Imagine holding a tray with a heavy cake on it-- do you want that close to your body, or out and far ahead of you, while you stay soft in you elbows. Feel that in your own body; that’s the problem right there.

That is actually really interesting that you pointed that out. I did a test at my desk and noticed that when my arms are out in front of me, my biceps and triceps handle the weight. But, when I bring my elbows in, my shoulders/traps handle most of the weight but I do feel my abs slightly engaging.