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May 2007 • VOLUME 21 • © HORSES For LIFE™ Magazine
Many instructors, clinic holders, trainers and lecturers say that the main focus should be on the hindquarters and their work. The hands should do as little as possible to influence the front end of the horse. But if that is so, then why do breeders put so much emphasis on the conformation of the neck? Why do the FEI rules for dressage competition describe in detail the posture of the head and neck? Why are there rein aids? Why is contact so important? Well, most trainers and instructors realize that the absolute majority of riders naturally try to ride the front end of the horse too much and the hindquarters too little. People are very hand-oriented and we are indeed skilled with our hands, so we tend to do everything with them. We tend to concentrate too much on the head and neck because that's what we see in front of us too, unlike the hindquarters which we never see. It's true, the head and neck do play a great role in the horse's balance and in riding of any discipline. But without the correct work of the hindquarters and trunk (back and abdominal muscles) any beneficial positioning of the neck will only turn into a problem, a flaw, a way for the horse to avoid correct (hard) work. That's why the focus is on working correctly behind, and when that's accomplished, the small adjustments with the hands will be so effective that they will be very discrete and less frequent. But they still exist, and rightfully so. If we look at the horse's build and biomechanics, we can begin to understand what the head and neck positions and movements can do. But in order to understand it we must begin with understanding the hindquarters. The hind legs and hindquarters drive the horse forward . The front legs support the body weight and let the mass of the horse move over their support. To a large extent this is how it works, but it's not totally black and white. The front legs also drive forward to some extent and the hind legs also support the weight to some extent. For example, some poorly-conformed horses do not drive forward so much with the hind legs, but more tilt the body forwards by drawing the front legs backwards. They then move the legs forward to catch themselves from falling. You can try this on yourself. Stand up and lean forward until you begin to topple over. Do not move a leg forward to catch your weight until you begin to feel yourself fall.. Then keep leaning forward so you topple over again, and take the next step the same way. Not very athletic, is it? The more athletic way is for the hind legs to support the bodyweight. Normally, in order to push the body forwards, the hind legs must be in a backwards pointing stance, to be able to push. When the hind legs land, they instead point forward. In the landing phase, the hind legs may or may not compress. When they do not compress, including the lumbar back and stifle, the horse can only gain energy by pushing the body forwards as the hind leg pushes behind the body and the hind legs point backwards. Alternatively, the hind legs can bend (compress) in all joints, including lumbar back, hip, knee, hock and pastern. Because the croup "tucks" in this bending, the massive muscles of the croup and back pull and lift the trunk over the hip, like a crane. If you look at this stance in the trot gait, you realize that in this instance the front leg on the same side is lifted. The hind leg helps keep the trunk on the same side from dipping, from over-weighing the diagonal front leg - from putting the horse on the forehand! When the lumbar back and/or stifle is not bent, then this effect works only when the hindleg is in the landing and stance phase. As soon as it starts pointing back, it can only push, and we lose this lifting effect. This is thus why the collected horse is in effect taught to keep this compression in the joints throughout the swing phase. Because of the tilt in the lumbar back, the hind leg then does not go behind the horse, rather the horse tends to lift his hind leg sooner, raise it higher and put it down sooner. To enable this type of athletic work, we want to see build-up of large muscles in the croup and back area. Other muscles and their correct work is vital to this athleticism too, but they are less visible, and so most people judge a horse's fitness for dressage from the size of the croup and back muscles. In achieving this development of the hindquarters, the role of the head and neck becomes more clear. In the young horse, when he is first loaded by the weight of the rider, no muscles are strong enough to help the horse from sagging his back. The abdominals are unused to the load, and the horse tenses his back against the discomfort. But the neck can do the same work from the front as the hind legs do from behind, to help lift the back, especially where the rider sits! So the young horse must be trained little, often, and carefully, to strengthen him so he can cope with the unaccustomed load. If you look at the horse from the side, look at the topline and belly, he actually looks sway-backed. The spine inside the flesh isn't as swayed as the topline looks, it can be straight or even convex, but we can't see it from the outside. The trunk of the horse is heavy. It consists of 57% of the total body weight of the horse, and it's suspended like a bridge, between the forehand and hindquarters. The horse has to use muscle work to help the spine support the weight of the viscera. This is where most modern instructors talk about belly muscles. The straight abdominal muscles help to stabilize the trunk, so that the horse does not sag by gravity, or "press down" his back and work sway-backed. The iIliopsoas muscles help flex the croup and hip, and especially swing the hind legs well forward. But what does the neck do? Having the head and neck lowered helps to support a heavy grass-filled belly. It also gives support to the ridden horse who carries the additional weight of the rider on his back. In many books, scientific papers and other biomechanics writings, you can read about this effect and they repeat one idea above all: how the Nuchal Ligament pulls on the spinous processes of the withers to raise the thoracical back. The most popular source for this idea is the book "Physical Therapy and Massage for the Horse" by Prof. Jean-Marie Denoix and therapist Jean-Pierre Pailloux. They explain how they researched this function of the horse by using dead horse bodies stripped of all muscles(!) and how the lowering of the neck pulled on the ligament to pull the (stripped, light) spinal column of the back up into an arch. This is only partially (a quite small part) true. What the nuchal ligament does the most is give passive support to the much lighter head and neck, and in particular the spinal column of the head and neck. It has a draping of lamellae that attach to most of the vertebrae of the neck, and help keep them in order and place, even when the muscles try to pull them in other directions. This ligament is also elastic enough that the horse can hold his head and neck stretched down for grazing on the ground without effort for hours! When we ride, we want muscle work, not passive leverage. If we wanted passive leverage, we could teach our horses to topple forward and catch themselves, as described above. But we want active muscle work, and we evaluate the correctness of the work on the growth of the muscles of the back and croup but also, to a large part, the muscles of the neck. So it's muscle work, not ligament work. With the active leverage of the crane from the croup, the lift through the withers and telescoping neck becomes a possibility and a reality. It is the ability of the neck to telescope within collection which provides the first indication of the true excellence and correctness of the work. Something so very little seen. True mastery of equitation provides us with long beautiful gorgeous and powerful necks. Look to the neck as your guideline of how to improve your horsemanship. Little by little the longer, the stronger the neck becomes at each stage of training, it brings you and your horse one step closer to the ultimate of equitation, and true beauty is the result. {/viewonly}
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