The Double Bridle

It’s been another busy week…

This week I had the pleasure of attending the British Dressage Regional Championships with Craig Messenger from https://www.asterhorses.co.uk/on his 7 YO Aster Niko who won the Elementary class…IN A SNAFFLE!

Dressage Levels
As all dressage riders know, when you reach Elementary level you can change your horse from a snaffle into a double bridle, but is it always the right choice?

Many riders can be rather keen to switch to a double bridle when they reach this level as it can really change a horses way of going, and usually seen as a huge step forwards.
However, it may not always be for the better. Allow me to explain…

Craig and Aster Niko

I have worked with Craig and Niko for a while, and have watched their progress in training. Niko is a big lad, now standing at 18.3 at 7 years old, with well developed body musculature and balance. Craig has brought him on slowly using strength building exercises to improve suppleness and balance in a snaffle. This has enabled Niko to learn self carriage, and to engage his hind legs. At this stage of training where a horse has moved up a level and a change of frame and engagement is desired, for most riders the temptation to change to a double is very desirable. However, Craig was reluctant to make this change without proper evaluation of Nikos’ mouth and if it would be appropriate at this point in his training.

We worked together to ascertain if there was any advantages to change to a double and if Nikos’ young mouth was ready for one. Upon starting this bitting journey, and testing a few combinations we quickly realised that Niko was most happy in the snaffle, in both his mouth and body.

Upon our trials, Craig felt he had better results with changing the frame and communication in the snaffle rather than the double.
The snaffle allowed Niko to be really confident to take the contact forwards and cover the ground, to engage his hind end without any impaction on the poll and neck, which in turn made the medium paces come more naturally.

When Niko was in a double, Craig felt he was lighter to the hand, yet he needed to use more leg than he would usually like, to encourage Niko to do the above mentioned work, hence why he preferred the contact feel from a snaffle at this stage of training. This exercise gave Craig the immediate comparison between the snaffle and double, and preferred the more stable feel to the contact with the snaffle.

Trouble With the Double

Lighter Contact to the Bit is something a lot of riders may like when changing into a double but may overlook the training implications it can have.

This feel in the hand is what we call an ‘imposter feeling’. It may make the horse feel lighter, but in fact they are not properly engaged over the back or the hind end, thus gradually losing power.
Sometimes the horse may hollow a little in the back, which puts the horse behind the bit, and not wanting to take it forwards in a consistent contact. If this occurs, it can be one of the most difficult issues to correct.

If these issues are not understood, they will bring more problems further down the line, and also impact your horses’ physical well-being.

The journey to correct these issues may mean you need to back to basics, start again, retrain and undo the problem.

Listen to Your Horse

This reiterates my belief as a bit fitter that the comfort and happiness of the horse is the best pathway to progression. It’s not always appropriate to move the horse to a double bridle just to align with the expectations to the level of competition. The horses’ comfort and learning level is paramount, and great achievements can be made when we listen to our horses.