The Relationship Between Rider’s Body Posture and Horse Speed During Rising Trot in Equestrian Sports

Abstract

This study was carried out to observe the changes in horse speed with respect to the rider’s body posture during rising trot in equestrian sports. This research used purposive sampling technique with six participants recruited. All riders were asked to trot their horse in one straight line for a 6-m distance. Reflective markers were placed on the rider’s anatomical landmark as well as on the lower limb joint of the horse. A video camera was located 10 m from the sagittal plane of the horse’s straight line pathway. Lean forward rising position appeared to provide the fastest horse speed followed by upright rising and lean back rising position. Horse speed results were consistent with the horse’s stride length where the upright rising position provides the longest stride length. It showed that the rider’s hip angle does influence the horse speed, and as a result, it also showed that there was a strong correlation between horse speed and its stride length. Therefore, we can conclude that there was a relationship between rider’s body posture and speed of the horse.