Why do horses stumble?

We’ve all been there: we are riding and suddenly our horse stumbles, causing you to be (almost) thrown out of the saddle. And you start to think: my horse is stumbling more and more often lately, what could be the problem?

Horses stumble for several reasons: some horses are distracted or too ‘lazy to lift their feet’. In this case, you may help your horse to keep him focused or to do some exercises to improve the coordination of your horse. You can start for example with using cavaletti’s.

But stumbling isn’t always the consequence of being lazy. Some horses, who are always with their head high in the air, will have their lower neck muscles. This means their fore- and backhand will be poorly connected. Resulting in lesser movements that cause the horse to stumble.

Another cause could be that the saddle of your horse is not fitting well. When your saddle is not fitting well, it can be very painful for your horse which causes him to stumble. If you have hesitations about your saddle, you can always contact your vet or saddle-fitter to make your saddle more comfortable for your horse.

Besides that, it’s also important that you as a rider are in the middle of the saddle. When his rider is not well-balanced, a horse can’t be balanced either. He will have to correct the bad position of its rider, which can results in muscle pains mijn antwoord.

However in the end, some horses are more clumsy than other horses or have a lesser coordination which causes them to stumble. You can help him by keeping him ‘between your legs’ while riding and supporting him in the best way possible.