26/11/2025
HOW DOES RIDER PAIN AFFECT THEIR HORSE?
Whilst I sit here with a fairly gnarly lower left back pain, it made me think whether we really think that much about how rider pain might have an impact on their horse's way of going?
Historically, and quite naturally of course, if a horse shows signs of pain they are immediately rested and consultation with equine professionals is carried out to manage the horse appropriately. Where in contrast, when riders have pain we seem to just carry on.
Horses will develop a locomotive strategy for asymmetry of the rider, or a saddle that doesn't fit in order to alleviate any discomfort. Horses like predictability.
Let's try articulate this better:-
Picture the scene, we have a rider who has slipped off the last step of the muck heap and now has lower back pain. No major issue, just soft tissue but they're moving in a hollow way, shortening through one side. They get on their horse and they have the same adaptation as they have walking in a straight line. How does that affect the horse?
Research has found that when riders have an acute injury it took approximately 6 weeks for the horse to alter their gait in response to the asymmetries that had been induced by the injury of the rider.
So it's something to be really mindful of - if you have an injury: regroup, repair and recover, check your functional movement patterns again and then resume riding 🐴💗
*hobbles off to book my own body work treatment...
📷 North East Equine Photography
