Our story so far…
Fit and strong fitness professional (who aspires to be a decent dressage rider) meets incredibly skilled rider and teacher and then meets innovative physiotherapist. Three professionals, with diverse expertise, put their heads together to develop a set of exercises that will improve your riding position. Exclusive to the Horse Magazine, this series of articles is sure to challenge your mind and body!
Written by Lisa Champion, MSc (Exercise Science) and Anna-Louise Bouvier*, BachAppSc(Phty) MAPA Physiotherapist. In conjunction with
Larissa Chadwick, Grand Prix Rider and NCAS Level 1 Coach.

© Physiocise

*Anna Louise is the creator of the Posture Dot system for postural awareness. Her company Physiocise customises core stability and flexibility programs for clients ranging from NSW Rugby Union to Qantas. More on the relationship of posture and back pain can be found in her recent book Fix Your Back published by ABC Books and available at all ABC shops and quality book stores.

Setting the scene:
I am a fitness professional. Twenty years ago, as a young adult, I got a master’s degree in exercise science and have worked in the fitness industry ever since. I’ve also been a keen athlete, over the years competing in triathlons, marathons, teaching aerobics classes and weight training. Even after having four children, my body has stayed trimmed, toned and strong. So, when I decided to take up dressage riding four years ago, I thought all that ‘exercise history’ would naturally make me a pretty good rider.
I quickly realised that all the strength and fitness in the world was not what I needed to become effective on the horse. Instead I began a sometimes difficult and frustrating journey to become a better rider. I hope that in this series of articles you may recognise your own journey and find that some of the strategies and skills I have learnt may help you, as they have me.

The first part of the journey was finding a coach. I was very fortunate to find the brilliant Larissa Chadwick. Together we set about developing my riding. After all I was motivated, fit, committed, analytical and intelligent, how hard could this be? In fact after a while I realised it was some of those things that were actually making it harder for me to improve my riding.
Larissa and I trained (and still train) two or three times a week. Over the months we constantly tried to unpick what was happening in my body. Session after session, Larissa would say, "I can see all the muscles in your arms contracted! Relax your arms, relax your shoulders!" or "You’re too stiff in your middle in the sitting trot – relax more!" Intellectually I knew what I had to do, the trouble was the harder I tried, the tenser I got. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t let go of the tension in my limbs and ‘just relax’. Determined to unravel the mysteries of great riding, the journey to find softness began. The more I searched the more I realised the softness I was looking for was actually the product of skill rather than strength. My fitness background was helping to an extent, but there was a piece missing.
So began the second step. Earlier, I had the great fortune to come across Anna-Louise Bouvier, the most ‘out of the square’ physiotherapist you could imagine. Anna-Louise’s gift is in improving posture and developing sport-specific exercises to either stretch or strengthen different body parts, depending upon the body’s habitual responses and the skill or movement required. And so the three heads combined. The coach, Larissa, with her skill and knowledge of riding technique. The student, myself, with my fitness background and the Physiotherapist, Anna-Louise, with her muscle and movement analysis skills.
The result has been a program of exercises and posture cues that are totally specific for riding. You may recognize some of the issues with your riding in these photos and stories. We hope that you can use these exercises and strategies to really make a difference to your riding. You too can learn to ride smarter not harder.The foundation of a well-balanced and controlled body

A Stable Core
If you have had any exposure to the fitness industry or perhaps had the chance to attend Pilates classes in recent times, you will have heard the buzz word ‘core stability’. In previous issues of The Horse Magazine, Lisa Wilcox has talked about how important her stomach is to her riding. What she is describing is a feeling of stability in her core or centre, from which all other movement originates. Stability in this area allows the arms and legs to function independently and leads to the look of softness and stillness that is so apparent when you watch really good riders in action. These gifted riders, who naturally have incredible stability in their core (usually without even knowing it!), make up only a slim percentage of all riders. The other 95% of riders need to work on improving the stability of their centre through specific exercises.

What happens if you lack core stability when riding?
If your core is unstable it will affect your riding in many ways. You may grip with other muscles in your body that are strong, for example your arms or legs. You may move around too much in the saddle. You may compensate for one movement of the body by moving another or you may compensate for the horse’s movement with excessive movement of your own body. With all these compensations your riding posture will be compromised (as will your posture in general), with the result being a lack of effectiveness and sometimes even back or neck pain. Some riders also have trouble breathing when riding. In short, a lack of stability in the core will show up as a host of problems both on and off the horse.
This is where Anna-Louise’s expertise came in. Larissa gave me the cues that I needed to improve my riding but even though I knew intellectually what I needed to do, I just couldn’t get my body to translate that into my riding. Anna-Louise assessed my posture off the horse to determine if there were imbalances and subtle weaknesses for which I was compensating when I rode.
Anna-Louise categorises the three most common postural problems off the horse as the Swayback, where you have an increase in the curvature of your lower back (Photo 1); the Slumper, where your shoulders are collapsed forward and the upper back is rounded out (Photo 2); and the Sideways Curver, where you have a mild curve in your spine which results in lots of subtle muscle imbalances between the sides of your body.
Her system of Posture Dots, placed on each shoulder and one in the centre of the chest, allows you to see more clearly how these incorrect positions affect our body. Think of the building blocks of the body as your head (as you will see from the photos, she uses a hibiscus suspended over the head to makes the alignment problems clearer!), your middle corset area and your pelvis, these incorrect postures put those elements out of line and put extra load on all the supporting muscles. Over time some muscles become weaker, other tighter until the posture becomes increasingly fixed.
My first revelation was that I was a Sideways Curver (with a bit of swayback to boot). Anna-Louise found that over the years I had developed really significant differences in the muscles on one side of my body compared to the other. Consequently when I rode I was unable to keep balanced because these muscles kept pulling me out of position. I even started putting a spur mark on my horse, but only on the left side. The fitness professional in me recognised the problem but the rider in me couldn’t work out how to fix it. Consequently I had developed all these compensation mechanisms to try and achieve what my coach was asking me to do. The old adage the mind was willing but the flesh was weak, held true!

Because alignment is such a critical part of riding, poor postural alignment dramatically affects the rider’s ability to stabilise on the horse. In the series of photographs shown here, you can see the most common ‘off the horse’ postural problems reflected in incorrect riding postures. (Photo 4 Swayback, Photo 5 Slumper, Photo 6 Sideways Curver). The other two common incorrect riding postures - Leaning Forward (Photo 7) and Leaning Back (Photo 8) are also a result of lack of core stability. Notice how the building blocks are out of alignment, compared to those on the correct riding posture (Photo 8). Notice the poor alignment of the building blocks in the incorrect postures, compared to the correct.

Posture and your core
I had been aware of the need to develop ‘core strength’ and had been using a fitball and other unstable exercise tools for several years. I was absolutely shocked to discover that great core stability had nothing to do with being strong. In fact, because I was strong, I was using lots of different muscles in my body instead of my deep core. With Anna Louise’s help, I learned that I needed stability, not strength. Stability is being able to hold your trunk, balanced against gravity for long periods of time without getting tired. My sideways curve and slight swayback had tipped me subtly so out of balance that I could barely sit for any length of time on a chair without wanting to slump, let alone sit balanced on a horse. This was the beginning of my realisation that the softness my coach wanted from me would actually come if I could develop some stability and control in my trunk. Imagine your core as a corset around the middle of your body. The front of the corset is a muscle called your transverse abdominus (TA) which acts like a belt running horizontally around your centre and provides stability to the abdomen. The back of the corset is made up of the deep back muscles that work together with the TA to provide stability to your back. The top of the corset is your diaphragm, the primary breathing muscle, and at the bottom of the corset are your pelvic floor muscles, the sling of musculature that is at the base of the pelvis.

The body is basically made up of two types of muscles. Postural muscles and global muscles. The muscles that make up your core are postural muscles, which means that they are low grade, sub maximal, ‘unconscious’ types of muscles. They are meant to be able to stay on for long periods of time without getting tired. Your global muscles are the bigger, stronger, willingly flexed and extended muscles on the outside of the body. When the postural muscles are weak, the global muscles happily kick in to help with the job of keeping the body upright. They have a field day stretching, tightening or getting stronger as they compensate for what’s missing in the core. The more challenging a physical activity is, the more the global muscles will compensate if the core is weak.
Signs that the global muscles are over working are excessive gripping, tilting, tenseness, and the need to constantly push and pull when riding. Riding exaggerates the inadequacies of our core stability, because when the body has to cope with the dynamic movement of the horse there is a lot more compensation needed if the core is not stable enough to help us sit still and deep. In short rather than using skill and control (the role of a stable core) we compensate be trying too hard and over activating inappropriate muscles (the global muscular compensation system).

So how can you stabilise your core?
The first step to improving your riding posture is awareness. You need to become aware of your core muscles and how they work. Anna-Louise has developed many core stability exercises and chose three main ones to help my riding. These exercises will help any rider gain better core stability and control. They target the three elements of the core- that is the "lid" or diaphragm, the walls or TA and finally the floor, which is the pelvic floor (this is not only women’s business – men have pelvic floor muscles too and need to strengthen them just as much!). It is vital that you train each part of your core, as each element is totally interdependent on the other. It’s not enough to have a great TA if you can’t breathe when you use it!

Breath work- activating the lid of your core
In the fast paced world we survive in, our breath tends to get ‘stuck’ in the top 1/3 of our chest. To work on your breath, you have to first sit properly. Anna-Louise calls this Balancing Your Bottom Bones (BBB) which, as any rider knows, is an essential element of a good seat. Using the edge of a chair, sit down and allow yourself to sit like a Slumper. Now sit up very straight and allow yourself to sit like a Swayback. Now, find the middle of these two positions (Photo 9). You should now be balanced perfectly on your sitting bones. You may need to place your hands under your bottom as you do this to really feel where your bottom bones are. This exercise in itself can be done each time you sit down in a chair or in the saddle. Now place your hands on your rib cage (Photo 10). Without straining or forcing your breath, try breathing deeply and softly into your rib cage. Breathe in through your nose as you imagine that your rib cage is gently pushing your hands sideways. It is also very helpful to imagine that you are allowing your back to open and the breath is filling up your back. Use your hands to give you feedback about whether the breath is travelling in the correct direction. Remember not to strain or force the breath and to keep your shoulders relaxed. Once you have practiced this deeper breathing (which opens up your diaphragm) in a controlled way, you can practice it regularly throughout the day as you are just going about your business. Once you get on the horse, you can practice the breathing at the start of your ride as you are warming up, and then whenever else you can remember to do it!

Activating the TA- training the walls of your core
Sit on a chair, one hand on your rib cage and one hand on your tummy. Let your tummy fully sag out (Photo 11). Take a slow breath in through your nose and as you breath out, imagine that your tummy is moving gently in towards your spine (Photo 12). Try to keep your back still as you activate your tummy. Repeat the cycle of allowing the tummy to sag as you breath in and then moving your tummy towards your back as you breathe out. Remember not to force the motion and do not ‘over breathe.’ With practice, your tranverse abdominus muscle will stay quietly activated, even when you are not thinking about it. On the horse, this translates to a postural position with more integrity, supported by an activated TA!

Strengthening the pelvic floor- training the floor of your core
In order to strengthen the pelvic floor muscles, you have to have a clear understanding of where they are and how they work. Think of the pelvic floor as the muscles that connect the front of your pelvis with the back of the pelvis, like a sling. When the pelvic floor muscles activate, the TA and the deep back muscles activate as well. If you can link this action in with good breathing techniques, your core stability is on the way to greatness! Both women and men have pelvic floor muscles that will benefit from being strengthened.
The positions that Anna-Louise uses to isolate the pelvic floor vary but it is good to start in a lying position with your feet together and your knees apart. Place your hands as you did for your seated TA activation work - one on the rib cage, one on the tummy. Bend your knees up and place your feet on the floor. (Photo 13) Imagine that the sling of muscle that is connecting the front of your pelvis to the back of the pelvis has a straw in the middle of it, running up towards your belly button. At the end of the straw, there is a pea. Take a slow breath in from the nose as your rib cage opens. Now, as you slowly exhale, draw the pea up into the straw. Relax, let the pea drop back down the straw, and repeat. It takes quite strong visual imagery to get the breathing and the muscle activation coordinated! As you are exhaling and the pea is being drawn up the straw, you should feel your tummy lower. Once you have mastered this technique, you can challenge the pelvic floor muscles more by lowering the leg on the out breath (Photo 14). As you lower the leg, you will feel that your whole body wants to roll in that direction. Concentrate on the pea coming up through the straw and your tummy moving towards your spine. This will stabilise your core so the leg can act independently. As we need good core stability for so long while we are riding, build up to doing 30 or more of the leg drops on each side.
You can also strengthen your pelvic floor in a standing position. Support your upper body on a chair or table and let your tummy drop (Photo 15). Then use the exact same cues to activate the pelvic floor (pea up the straw on the out breath). You can do these exercises any time of the day!
Strengthening the pelvic floor does NOT involve squeezing the gluteal muscles (the ones in your bottom), or using your adductors (the muscles on the inside of your legs). Try to keep these global muscles turned OFF as you concentrate on the deep muscles of your corset. One hint that you may have weakness at the base of your core is that you use the global compensating muscles, such as the adductors to compensate when you are riding. This will manifest itself as tenseness in the legs and a tendency to have to grip with the inside of your legs rather than being able to keep them soft and relaxed as you ride. In the beginning you may have to do these exercises with your eyes closed, just to concentrate fully on the correct technique. As you get better at them, work towards doing them with the eyes open, so your eyes can take in your surroundings while you are focussing on your core (more like you’ll need to do when you’re riding).

Remember: Strengthening your core takes time and lots of practice. Because you are retraining your postural muscles you may not feel very much. Close your eyes and try to visualise the movement, and you will gradually feel a "drawing" in feeling. Anna-Louise finds that often it can take clients up to 10 weeks to feel they are developing any real core control, depending on whether they have had previous injuries or if their posture has been very poor. Relate it back to your riding experience. You know how difficult it can be to develop good control in certain skills, approach training the pelvic floor in the same way.

The riding application
Back to the coach and her enthusiastic student.
Because these exercises require concentration, they are not easy to do while you are riding. You can use time that you are just sitting on your horse to practice them, but more practically, it is the work you do OFF the horse that will teach your body new patterning that will AUTOMATICALLY help when you are on the horse. If you are willing to make the commitment to improving the stability of your core, you will most definitely see the difference over time to your posture and your riding position.

Interestingly, when Larissa was trying to ride in the incorrect postures (very difficult for a naturally talented and stable rider) for this photo shoot, she was saying things like, "this really hurts my back" and "I can’t breath when I’m in this position!" She felt the use of the posture dots during riding (very sophisticated pieces of yellow paper stuck on with sticky tape) was an excellent way to pinpoint postural problems. We’d like to encourage all riders to try videoing themselves with a large set of dots in place. You may be surprised at what you see!
In the next article of the series where we look at core stability in relationship to the rider’s leg position.

The Core Stabiliser Workout
Remember to try and do the breathing, pelvic floor and TA exercises at any time of the day, sitting, standing, lying, driving and riding. If you want a specific program, try this:
1) Sit in a chair and Balance you Bottom Bones (BBB)
2) Perform 20 Repetitions of the Rib Cage/Back Breathing
3) Do the TA Activation exercise for 20 Repetitions
4) Lay down on the floor and perform the ‘pea in the straw’ pelvic floor exercise for 10 Repetitions without moving the leg
5) Progress to doing between 10-30 repetitions with the leg dropping (do all the reps on one leg before switching to the next)
6) Stand up and do 10 repetitions of the Standing Pelvic Floor exercise
Go about your day with your core activated and your mind aware!