How to Adjust English Riding Stirrups

The length of a rider's stirrups can be the cause for a lot of things. If the stirrups are too long the rider will begin to stretch out their leg and ride off their toe. If the stirrups are too short the rider is not able to use their entire leg and many times begin to pivot off of their knee. Setting the perfect stirrup length is very basic, easily avoiding bad habits. Read on to learn how to adjust English riding stirrups.

Instructions

Difficulty: Easy

Things You’ll Need:

• Horse to ride
• Saddle with fairly decent stirrups
• Someone to assist you

1. Mount the horse from the left hand side.
2. Walk the horse around for a few minutes with both feet in the stirrups. While walking around stretch your weight down into your heels.
3. Make sure your girth is snug on the horse's side not allowing the saddle to move.
4. Halt your horse squarely.
5. Drop your feet from the stirrup irons and hang your legs straight down along your horse's side. Keep the bottom of your foot parallel to the ground.
6. Have someone take the stirrup iron and see where it matches up on your leg. The bottom of the iron should ideally touch the bulb of your ankle bone on the inside of your ankle. If you cannot get the iron to exactly meet with that bone, then adjust accordingly. The more advanced rider should take the longer length and the more novice rider should take the shorter length.
7. Ask the person assisting you to stand directly in front of your horse to make sure that the stirrups are even in length.

Tips & Warnings

• The beginner rider should have a shorter stirrup to teach them to balance their weight down into their heel.
• As the rider progresses and has a more educated leg, the stirrup length can be slightly extended, especially for equitation classes.
• Check the length of your stirrups on a regular basis because stirrups have a tendency to stretch.

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