01/13/2026
There is an end game for the higher hand posture - it’s just a different means to the same end ♥️
“But your hands are too high!”
Every now and then I get someone posting in the comments section something like “All you PK people ride with your hands too high!” It’s true that we raise our hands noticeably higher than most riders, so when someone who has been trained in a different way sees this, it looks really weird to them.
You may have heard about the ideal line between bit, hand and elbow. In the Ecole de Légèreté we do believe it’s the ideal, but it’s not how you ride to get to the finished product - it’s the desirable byproduct of there being nothing left to do. We have all sorts of various rein effects, which use a raising action of the hand. I won’t discuss that here, as I talk about the various rein effects in other posts. In this post I just want to talk about that straight line; although important, it’s not everything - and I don’t believe it’s a functional way to train when the horse is having problems.
Many people aim to keep a still hand, working on creating the ‘ideal’ line between bit, hand and elbow. But this means that the rider is absolutely forbidden to move the hands. Ever. To my way of thinking, this gives you a pretty limited toolbox when you are presented with even minor difficulties. What happens when you need to slow down, but you want to keep your ideal line? The action on the rein will almost invariably be backwards. And if you tighten the rein much, then you will need to shorten it to keep your ‘ideal line’ (otherwise your elbows come back as your hand approaches your crotch, and the line is broken). This also leads to the rider wanting to keep a pretty tight rein most of the time – heaven forbid if you had a long rein and the horse came above the bit, you’d have to move your hands a lot just to gather up the rein – and you lose your ‘ideal line’!
If the rider is acting backwards on that short rein, the pressure is downwards on the horse’s tongue. At this point, it is really common for the horse to ‘come light’ – by coming behind the vertical. That lightness is not desirable, because it is caused by him dropping the contact, with his poll no longer the highest point. Another common protest is for him to open his mouth – which is why thick, tight crank nose bands are so common.
One thing I notice from looking at lower level competitions is that the attempt to keep the hands still leads to the riders keeping pretty short reins, with quite braced arms. I think it’s because if you know you’re not allowed to move your hands, you need quite a firm contact for the horse to be able to feel the little signals to bend, turn and stop.
Not so long ago I had a person criticise one of my posts here because it showed all of the riders with hands above the ideal line. That person posted a picture of herself with the idea of demonstrating how it should be done – and the horse was strongly behind the vertical. But she was right, in actual fact there was a straight line between bit, elbow and hand – it was just oriented steeply towards the ground. She said to me “See, here is a beautiful, soft contact”, or something to that effect. Well, that’s not how it seems to me. What I see is a contortion in the horse’s spine, and a horse which is looking at his own knees. I want my horse to look out at the world – so I’m willing to raise my hands, and look a bit funny to other people.
If you train in the Ecole de Légèreté, it is really common to take a long, long time to learn how to lift your hands when the horse’s balance requires it. (We don’t just randomly raise the hands, there are various specific effects we are aiming for, such as: a demi-arête, action-reaction, or a single lifted hand to create a bend or counterbent, for example.) Once you’ve really understood how helpful a raised hand can be to a horse, you get it – and then you do have to address the fault that your hands tend to be a bit high all the time, even when the horse’s balance is quite good. It can take a long, long time to learn how and when you can lower your hands and seek out that lovely ideal line from bit to hand, to elbow.
Here’s a picture of me where I’m really trying to lower my hands to get the ideal line, but my hands are still too high if you could view it from the side. Regardless, I like the photo. Sparkle has a contact which appears to only be the weight of the rein, and she is in an elegant moment of the walk stride. I find it aesthetically pleasing that we have been captured in the light. Plus, I’m not looking down for a change!
