|
|
Post by jimmy on Mar 22, 2016 0:30:49 GMT
I generally ride with my toes pointing straight forward. When I need to use my spur, I will turn my foot out so I can roll my spur in, and then it goes straight again.
I have been playing with a little jumping. I noticed it is easier to get and keep my base of support through my calves and ankles and stirrup tread, if I turn my toes out a bit.
I have also noticed in teaching this young girl how to ride, and with other beginners, the hardest thing to get across is in keeping the heels down, so the ankles can work as shock absorbers, and they keep their stirrups.
So I am having the girl turn her toes out in order to keep her heels down. It seems to work immediately, without her trying to force her heels down, or toes up. I just say, turn your foot out. The heel goes down. Her support becomes stable.
Works on me too.
HG, you have spent way more time than me teaching young people to ride in a jumping saddle.
Is this a bad idea teaching her to turn her toes out? Is it incorrect for a jumping position?
|
|
|
|
Post by horseguy on Mar 22, 2016 13:04:34 GMT
Toes out in a traditional sense is incorrect. There are reasons for this judgment on toe position. The first and perhaps most practical is if you are fox hunting or riding fast and your toes are out they can catch a sapling between your leg and the saddle.
You have not really had an exciting moment on a horse until you are cantering along and catch a 1" sapling with your toe. It quickly rides up your boot, past your knee to your crotch just when all the little sapling branches whip between your breeches and your saddle. It sure can ruin a saddle and it is hell on breeches, not to mention... In that circumstances a rider soon learns to actually bury their toes in their horse. A more common reason for teaching toes forward and feet parallel to the horse's spine is with regard to the correct use of spurs. Allowing the toes to wander outward invites an inadvertent spur cue.
Personally, I get that it relaxes a rider's leg to turn the toes out, but it also places the wrong part of the calf on the horse for calf cues like bending on the inside leg in dressage. Few riders get to calf cues because they do not ride horses that are that subtle and well trained, but letting students apply more of the back of the calf instead of the side due to toes out, will eventually become a bigger issue, should they reach that higher level of riding.
I am a pretty strict traditionalist and I always told parents that I would train their child like they where going to be in the Olympics, because I don't know their child won't be in the Olympics. Better safe than sorry. Therefore, toes are forward, not out for me as an instructor.
The question of how to achieve a soft ankle remains. The Hunter/Jumper method is to yell "HEELS DOWN" over and over. I think that is an inefficient and obnoxious method to teach. The best way to teach a student to keep their heels down and to develop a solid base of support in the irons is to lunge them in a round pen with no reins. Once they can canter the circle, add ground poles at canter distance in half or a quarter of the circle, then add low cross rails on stride in a portion of the circle. Eventually most of my students got to jumping 2'3" on a lunge line, the height of a 30 gallon plastic barrel, jumping with no reins. That no reins circle sequence absolutely requires heels down and you never have to shout it. My second favorite way to teach a student rider to keep their heels down is to send them out on a 3 or 4 hour hunt. No one can be up on the toes in the irons after that much riding. Exhaustion develops an efficient riding position.
By the way, the round pen no reins sequence also teaches a correct fold at the hips, centering balance both laterally and longitudinally, and it tends to prevent a hollow backed rider over a jump, in addition to heels down.
That said, if I had a student who was older and did to have intense long term riding goals, but just wanted to enjoy being on a horse, I'd look the other way on toes out. It does work up to a point, and life is short. The line between being a tradition Nazi and a useful teacher can be hard to define sometimes. Hope this helps.
|
|
|
|
Post by jimmy on Mar 22, 2016 14:47:31 GMT
Yes very helpful. Thank you.
I had a hunch this was the case. The problem is in the teaching. And the most common problem is the lack of support in the lower legs and feet in the stirrups.
I do not want to be the guy who later gets blamed for teaching someone wrong, and have another instructor ask, who taught you that?
|
|
|
|
Post by jimmy on Mar 22, 2016 15:32:49 GMT
I am not a trained instructor in any way. So I just kind of make up things as I go.
Like this.
To demonstrate how stable you are with your weight distributed correctly down through your legs, I had her stand in front of me on the ground, and bend her knees slightly and put her weight down through her heels. Then I pushed on her a little. She was able to brace and balance against the force put on her.
Then I had her do the same thing, only put her weight on her toes. She almost fell over.
I thought that worked pretty well as a demonstration.
|
|
|
|
Post by horseguy on Mar 22, 2016 16:44:41 GMT
The weight in the toes is a relatively new thing. The Army rode with the foot or boot "home" meaning all the way into the stirrup to the boot heel. While this created a loss of some flexibility in the ankle joint, it created a more stable foot in the irons for combat. Polo player still ride with boots "home" as do many fox hunters.
My theory is that the new toes on the irons creates an impulse to raise the heels. I tell new riders to place the irons slightly behind the ball of the foot.
Gen. George Patton
This is Patton later in life. By then he was a regular equestrian competitor and probably adjusted his foot position away from the Army standard to gain ankle flexibility in jumping competitions, which is where the toe thing came from, I think. He looks relaxed and his toes are a tad outward. By this time in his life after a World War and other deployments like chasing Poncho Villa in Mexico, he most likely felt he could ride as he pleased. Note that he riding is on a simulated raise railroad trestle and jumping. Now there is relaxed place to ride.
Another thing I do to address foot position is have a student stand in the irons in a 2 pointish sort of position with legs flexed and relaxed while the horse is standing still. I stand on the ground and hold both reins as if my hands are the horse's "mouth". I can feel them using the reins to balance, which is one effect of being on your toes riding. I hold them up with the reins and then surprise them by letting go of the reins. They fall backward into the saddle. The next few times doing this they try to avoid me dropping them back into the saddle, so they adjust their body position. In the adjustments they make, most discover that the heels down is more stable. Your exercise reminded me of this exercise. |
|
|
|
Post by rideanotherday on Mar 22, 2016 16:58:09 GMT
It takes time for beginner riders to develop the leg enough to hold their foot parallel to the horse with the ankle flexed.
Better for your student to learn it right now than to have to unlearn poor habits later.
|
|
|
|
Post by jimmy on Mar 22, 2016 23:43:06 GMT
The stirrups I normally ride in are 5 inch bells. The tread is so wide, your whole foot goes in. So you don't have all the weight on the toes or even the ball of your foot. It is quite different also than the "heels down, toes up" mantra.
The other stirrups I used to ride in were either oxbows, or really narrow tread. With those, I would ride with my feet all the way in until the heel of my boot stopped them. Again, very secure, but not the equitation ideal.
It seems like once you master how to use your ankles and feet, it doesn't seem near as important as it did when you were first learning.
|
|
|
|
Post by horseguy on Mar 23, 2016 19:30:15 GMT
The US Army put wide bell stirrups on the McClellan saddles until right before WW1.
The correct foot position was level with the ground.
The next Army stirrup was metal in the Fillis style, which is the common style today.
But when the Army stirrup changed, the foot position did not. It remained parallel with the ground.
The heels way down toes on stirrups position of today comes from the modern Grand Prix jumping ranks. something that never caught on in polo or fox hunting because it is impractical when moving around the saddle to hit the ball in polo and over terrain in hunting. In the Patton picture, he has his heels down more that was the standard, but it looks to me like he is in a defensive landing foot position.
This is the "correct" by the book US Cavalry foot position and judging from the uniform this is the 1940s. Home, toes forward and sole parallel with the ground. 
|
|
