Are You Using the Correct Fingers?

I've talked before about the importance of not letting your body tip forward. You can check out Tips for a New Jumper - Part 2 for multiple reasons why leaning forward is a bad practice in jumping. While it's great to understand conceptually that being forward is not desirable, actually changing your posture is easier said than done.

As it turns out, there are many ways to accidentally be forward, and some of them are due to only tiny shifts in your body! Your head, shoulders, and hip angle are the common culprits, but did you know that your fingers could also be to blame?

Image by Miriam Müller from Pixabay

Now this is one of the things that makes me really love horseback riding. The physical connection between you and your horse is so sensitive, so intimate, that even tiny, seemingly unrelated changes translate to your partner.

Coincidentally this is also one of the things that intimidates me into feelings of "not good enough" or "unsuitable for this sport". I am periodically neurotic enough to find the idea of just how quiet of aids your horse can respond to somewhat panic inducing.

Holy cow I definitely do not have strong body control and coordination! I am a NERD not an athlete! What if my poor horse is just so annoyed by all the random miscues I send? I'll never get the hang of every little thing!  

I don't know if the rest of you have a crazy voice inside too, but thankfully I've gotten halfway decent at slamming the door on that pesky thing. Yes, your horse can feel tiny changes, and that's really cool! It's what makes this sport so rewarding and worthwhile. It's the foundation of that addicting horse-connection that we are all drawn to.

Just as you have patience and forgiveness (most of the time) for your horse's errors and struggles, it works both ways. Assuming that you are paired with a horse that is appropriate for your skill level, he will have patience and forgiveness for you as you learn also.

There is no rule that says you must have x amount of athletic skill in order to learn to ride well. All it takes is time and thoughtful practice. Trying is all we ask of our horses and all we need to ask of ourselves. Yes a rider with more natural talent may progress faster and farther, but don't stifle your own growth with preconceived notions about your own athletic potential.

But I digress, this was about hands! Or more specifically, fingers! Chances are that most of us learned how to hold the reins very early on and really haven't thought about it much since. Well it's time to think about it again. The question you want to ask yourself is which finger(s) is/are doing the most work, predominantly holding and controlling the reins?

Did you answer your ring finger? Great! That's exactly what you want. If you said index finger and thumb, don't feel bad. That's a pretty common answer. But the point of this blog post is to look at how our fingers on the reins function, and realize that thumb and forefinger is not best. If you were thinking it's a trick question and answered all of them, that's not too far from the mark either.

Now before I explain anything about the anatomy and function of fingers I will point out that I am no scientist or doctor. This is my educated opinion that I believe to be correct but you should in no way consider it absolute truth. It's internet truth at best. I'm also not particularly gifted at biology so I apologize if I misuse any anatomy terms here.

The bottom line in why you should use one finger over another comes down to radial and ulnar nerves. 

In our daily life we predominantly use our index fingers and thumbs the most. It's how we make use of our advantageous opposable thumbs. It's pretty natural in horseback riding to grip the reins tightly between our index finger and thumb; it does make for a strong hold. However, this tendency has two downsides.

One, since this is more of a pinch grip, it's somewhat less soft and flexible in terms of communicating with the horse. On the other end of those reins is a metal bit inside a horse's mouth, a mouth which necessarily must have motion when the horse is moving. Our hands need to be strong enough to maintain our rein contact, but they must also be soft and giving to feel and respond to the movement of the horse's head. A pinch grip with thumb and forefinger on the reins interferes with the feeling and responsiveness of our hands on the reins.

Now where do the radial and ulnar nerves come in? That's the second downside to using your index finger and thumb to grip the reins.

To oversimplify, the radial nerve is relevant to your thumb, index finger, and middle finger and connects them to the muscles on the front of your arm, namely your bicep. The ulnar nerve relates to your ring and pinky fingers and connects to the muscles on the back of your arm, predominantly the tricep.

Now it's certainly not really that simple. The division of which nerve touches what isn't quite that black and white, and there is a medial nerve, plus plenty of muscles and tendons that have roles to play. But for our purposes we don't need to get into all that. If you want a more in depth diagram of the radial and ulnar nerves, here is some great information from the Case School of Medicine.

When you use your thumb and index finger to grip the reins, you engage the muscles on the front of your arm, up to and including your bicep. When you contract the muscles on the front of your arm, your shoulders automatically round forward and your sternum caves in. All of this works together to tip your upper body forward and negatively effect your posture in the saddle.

Conversely, if you use your ring finger as the main tool to grip your reins, you get the opposite effect. Your ring finger will engage the muscles along the back of your arm, up to and including your tricep. By contracting the muscles along the back of your arms you will bring your shoulders down and back, raise your sternum, thus reinforcing good posture.

Your pinky finger has the same connection to the ulnar nerve and the back of your arm as the ring finger, but it is not a particularly strong finger. Also, since most of us are taught to hold the reins between our ring and pinky fingers, the pinky finger can apply upward pressure on the rein against your ring finger, but it cannot wrap around the rein itself.

Ok so we should be closing our ring finger strongly around the reins to reinforce good posture. This is all well and good but how do we put it into practice?

Making new habits can be challenging. If you find that your fingers are commonly too loose/open, or that you rarely use your ring finger enough, try riding for a little while with only your ring finger on the reins. This will feel very strange, but try to feel the change this creates in your shoulders and chest.

When your fingers get tired, return to holding the reins normally. Concentrate on using your ring finger first when half halting or halting your horse. With time it will become second nature.

Do you feel like which finger to use is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of problems you have with your hands? 

Well no worries, I've got a few other resources for you. If you are uncertain that you are holding your reins properly in the first place, you can find a detailed explanation on the It's My Pony website. If you feel you have bad habits, or that you just aren't good at rein contact yet, check out these exercises from the FEI website.

And in case you are wondering, Lauren where the heck do you come up with these blog ideas? How did you ever discover different fingers make big differences? Well yes of course I learn so much from my wonderful trainers, but I also read and study about riding when I can.

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This particular tip came from Wendy Murdoch's 50 5-Minute Fixes to Improve Your Riding. This book has a wealth of useful knowledge and exercises in it. I highly recommend it.

There are always an overwhelming number of tips, tricks, and tiny things to work on in your riding. And yes they do matter, because your horse can feel every little thing! But don't get overwhelmed by trying to tackle everything at once. Just pick one thing to work on, and then enjoy your ride. Maybe on your next ride you can think about which finger you are using the most.