Making The Connection

STIRRUP LEVELLING

by Wendy Murdoch

Top right: The inside of this stirrup is lower due to the short length of the leather and the roundness of the horse’s body. The board under the stirrup is being held level to show that it is significantly higher on the outside.

Right:Level. The same stirrup has been lowered, so it is below the curve of the horse’s body. It is now level to the board held underneath.

Riders can benefit from this straightforward way to 'pack' stirrup treads, thus maintain the feet in alignment and improve overall stability.

Whether your riding style is Western or English, you may have noticed ‘foot issues’ such as a tendency for your feet to ‘curl’ in the stirrups, difficulty in keeping your soles flat on the stirrup treads or your boots seeming to ‘jam’ against the outside edge of the irons. Often, these observations are also coupled with a feeling of instability in the legs and feet when in the saddle and, sometimes, with the presence of ankle or foot pain during and/or after a ride.

These issues are usually related to either the saddle being used or the rider’s conformation, and there are some simple ways to check which is the case. Fortunately, there are also a couple of easy ways to overcome these problems.

Flat = Stability and Support
If you’ve ever had a pair of ski boots adjusted to your feet, you might remember the salesperson ‘shimming’ (packing) the boots until you were in a neutral stance - meaning that an alignment was created from the centre of each boot through to the centre of your knee. This adjustment compensates for knock-knees or bowed legs, as well as any differences between each leg - the end result being that each ski is perfectly flat to the snow. Importantly, it is when a ski is flat that the skier has maximum stability and support.

Riding is not unlike skiing, in that having each foot flat on the stirrup will give the greatest amount of stability and support. Just like skiing, however, individual variation (differences in each person and in their two legs) can hamper this feeling, depriving a rider of a solid foundation.

Equipment Evaluation
Before blaming your body for any stability struggles you may have, first check your equipment by looking at each stirrup from the front when your saddle is in place and deciding if the tread is level or angled.

If the saddle is a Western style, the tread will almost certainly be angled, due to the effect of twisting the leather to make the stirrup perpendicular to the horse. When a flat plane (such as a stirrup leather) is twisted, it is no longer parallel to the ground and, in this case, twisting causes the inside of the stirrup to be lower than the outside. The wider the leather, the more the angle created.
The leathers on an English-style saddle don’t usually cause the same problem because they are so narrow. The stirrup treads can still become angled, however, if the horse is a very round shape, the leathers are very short and if the rider has full thighs. In this case, the stirrups usually don’t hang below the curve of the horse’s barrel, thus they are pushed out at an angle.

Shimmed Western stirrup. Using a combination of cardboard, vet wrap and duct tape, a shim has been fashioned to give the rider a level surface.



Rider Conformation
Regardless of whether the underlying cause of stirrup angling is your conformation, the saddle or both, the solution is basically the same - the stirrup needs to be ‘shimmed’ in order to create a place for your foot that will put you in a neutral stance, with even contact across the entire tread. Western stirrups will almost always have to be ‘shimmed’, so there is no need to worry about also assessing rider conformation. If you ride English, however, here’s how to do this with the assistance of a friend and a plumb-bob (a weight that is suspended from a string and used as a perpendicular reference line to the ground).

Have your assistant hold the plumb-bob in front of you when you’re standing on the ground so the string is centred on your kneecap, then ask them to note whether the bob hangs over your second toe. If it doesn’t, ask them to look to see if it hangs to the left or right. It’s important that the assistant does the observing of this as, if you try to do it yourself, it will interfere with the test.

If the plumb-bob is centred through your knee and over your second toe, the good news is that you won’t need any stirrup shims to correct your stance but, if it is to the left or right, you’ll need to make an adjustment to your stirrups on either the inside or the outside. The easiest way to do this is to use small pieces of cardboard and layer them under the appropriate side of each foot until, according to the plumb-bob and your assistant, the centre of the knee and the second toe are aligned. When the right amount of cardboard has been determined, the pieces can then be carefully placed onto each stirrup tread and held in position using latex, vet wrap or duct tape.

The same process of using pieces of cardboard can also be employed to solve stirrup angling that is more related to the saddle shape and/or width of the leathers. If the stirrup is angled lower on the inside (nearest the horse), layer cardboard on the tread until it is level then test-ride, adding or subtracting the pieces of padding until it feels comfortable. When the right amount of cardboard is in place, you should suddenly have a definite sensation of your feet being flat, along with an added sense of security in the saddle.

If you choose to use angled stirrups check they are on correctly (shorter branch of the stirrup towards the horse) and that the foot tread is level, not lower on the outside. With wedge pads, be prepared to file them down until the correct thickness is achieved.

Levelling out the feet not only improves the rider’s comfort level, but also their ability to communicate effectively with their horse.

About the Author
An international riding instructor/clinician, Wendy Murdoch resides in Washington VA USA and travels worldwide, teaching riders of all levels and disciplines how to improve the horse’s performance by improving their body position. Her book, Simplify Your Riding and DVDs Simplify Your Riding and Ride Like A Natural Part 1 –3 are available at www: murdochmethod.com.