When the outside rein is used correctly, it can influence how your horse’s entire body is moving and is an important tool in many riding disciplines. Incorrect use of your outside rein commonly results in balance and steering issues. So how do we use our outside rein? What’s its purpose? And how do we develop more “feel” to the outside? Let’s have a look.
Which Rein is the Outside Rein?
Yes, this is a trick question. When we’re just learning the basics, the outside rein is the rein closest to the wall, referring to the direction of travel. For instance, if you’re tracking right, your left hand would be considered the outside rein. As things get more complicated, the outside rein is to the outside of the horse’s bend.
For example, in a 10 meter circle right, your left rein would still be the outside rein. But in renvers tracking right, your right hand would be considered outside rein. Another example would be half pass right, another situation where things flip and your left hand would be the outside hand.
The Purpose of Your Outside Rein
There are many things your outside rein influences. One important use is helping to control the degree of bend in your horse’s neck. Circles, corners, and laterals require correct bend. It’s important to remember that too much or too little bend can negatively influence the movement you’re riding. When we look at the action of the inside leg asking for bend through the body, the outside of the horse expands, and the inside contracts, forming a half circle or banana shape around that inside leg. With that in mind, when we look at circles, correct bend is measured by the size of the circle. For example, a 20-meter circle would require less bend than a 10 meter circle. If you find your horse is overbent to the inside during circles, examine the degree of contact in your outside rein. Overbending creates a jack-knife effect which results in loss of impulsion and straightness. Severe cases of this leads to the horse falling out on the circle. If there is too much tension from the outside rein, your horse won’t be able to properly stretch through the outside of her body. This reduces the range of motion through the outside shoulder and in more severe cases can cause head tilting.
The next function of the outside rein is control of the horse’s shoulders. Too much bend or lack of straightness in general can cause your horse to fall in or out through the shoulder. When this happens, it’ll feel like your horse is leaning through turns like a motorcycle. The solution here is to create more impulsion with your inside leg and stabilize it with the outside rein, encouraging your horse to bend instead of lean. If your horse is really falling out, your outside rein close to the neck can be used to lift the shoulder toward the inside. This is an example of an indirect rein cue. To start understanding this feel, try riding some circles using your outside rein to steer your horse instead of your inside rein. As this feel progresses, it’s used along with the inside rein in movements like pirouettes. It’s very important to remember to never pull back with your outside rein or cross it over the neck.
Outside rein also enables the rider to better regulate the horse’s speed. If your horse is speeding forward, the gait begins to lack expression and your horse will lose his balance. When used along with seat and leg aids, the outside rein helps redirect forward energy into engagement and impulsion.
And finally, let’s look at half-halts. Half-halts are imperative for balance and preparation for transitions, movements, and changes of direction. It’s a way of letting the horse know “something’s up!” before asking for the next exercise. The outside rein, when combined with your seat and leg aids, is used to ride effective half-halts.
Connecting Your Horse to the Outside Rein
A quality outside rein connection starts with the hind legs. Remember that bend originates from the energy coming over your horse’s topline from his hindquarters. This energy comes to the bit, where the horse then stretches into the outside rein. Exercises with lots of (correct) bend are used to improve this feel. Riding the shoulder-in is especially helpful, as it helps improve your horse’s overall straightness and encourages collection through the mechanism of asking your horse to place more weight on his inside hind leg.
A Few More Pointers
Remember – not using your outside rein when you ride circles and changes of direction encourages your horse to fall out through his shoulder which results in a loss of straightness, balance, and impulsion. Not keeping connected with the outside rein also can cause issues with regulating the horse’s tempo and positioning of her shoulders. This causes issues in most exercises, especially laterals. A consistent and elastic outside rein connection helps direct the impulsion coming from your horse’s hind legs. And, I’d like to remind you one more time to NEVER cross your outside rein over your horse’s neck.
I’d like to thank you for hopping onto my blog for yet another post! I hope you’ve come away with some new information you can apply to your next ride, and now have a more advanced understanding of the function of the outside rein. If you have questions or are struggling, I would be happy to provide you with additional information and even one on one instruction to help get you and your horse on track. Feel free to contact me! You can also listen to a podcast episode covering this topic on your favorite podcast platform! As always, be sure to make your next ride a harmonious, connected, and confident one. Take care.