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| The Walking Horse Headnod Any horse will utilize the head and neck as counter-weight while walking, much like we swing our arms as we stride. The bigger we try to stride, the more we tend to pump our arms...the same happens with a horse who’s carrying himself in an evenly-timed flatfoot walk and running walk with neutral top line. The headnod has long been a signature characteristic of the Walking Horse. Due to the huge stride bred into these horses, they have the ability to utilize the head and neck weight as counter-balanced leverage to drive that huge stride, which in turn produces the headnod: more so than other breeds with lesser stride and looseness. Horses (as all animals do) will utilize counter-balance for any motion requiring effort to add leverage and power to that motion, as well as for balance. The bigger, stronger the motion, the more counter balance needed. We don’t need to swing our arms much as we’re strolling easily ...just enough to balance our bodies. But when we add speed and power to our walk we work our arms in energetic motion to add leverage and power to the push in our feet. Biomechanics tells us that this allows us to share the effort to push between more muscles throughout the body. Have you ever tried to throw a baseball without rotating your abdominal area or without counterbalancing with the opposite arm? Professional pitchers will even raise the opposite leg to increase their leverage and add power to their throws. The greater the energy needed, the greater the tendency to utilize counter-balanced movement. You can observe while watching athletic events that the natural counterbalance used will be on the opposite side of a central pivot point, usually the The headnod is not as dramatic in other horse breeds because of their shorter strides and tighter coupling. Our walking horses will carry us in that faster intermediate speed while remaining in the neutral walking frame. A properly executed flatfoot walk and running walk has no suspension and should be maintained in this relaxed frame. Developing the naturally brilliant headnod: I constantly receive emails from folks who have seen my horses or watched my videos asking "how do you get that headnod on those horses?" I am happy to share this with anyone interested... I wish to see our beloved breed reclaim this signature gait characteristic that is being almost lost with the advancement of the performance gaits that are so routinely tied in the show arenas. "Don't be afraid to go to the middle!" There is a reason that all the old-time video as well as what literature there is from that period, speaks of an "evenly timed gait"; that is gait that is neither toward the step-pace nor toward the foxtrot. Performance trainers seem to be so afraid of the diagonal going or trotty horse that they deliberately veer to the pace side... and there are many reasons for this. Many modern TWH trainers have no clue how to work with a trotty horse, so much so that I've heard caustic remarks and recommendations for owners to "shoot him". I believe they simply have no idea how to help and correct the trotty horse. I, personally, love working with what I call "default trotters" because once they find their smooth, evenly timed gaits, it often sticks for life. Plus they carry themselves in better posture to more easily pick up a beautiful, rolling canter, which is another thing the performance breeding is losing for us. But I digress:Steps to developing the headnod: Please note that big headnod depends on neutral top line, even gait, long stride, relaxed and loose movement. If you can get all of these coming together in your horse, he will invariably give you the best headnod he's capable of. Also note that the very same process for developing headnod can also result in extending the natural stride to its fullest potential, for those interested in developing a showy gait. The flatfoot walk is where the headnod is developed. The increased tempo of the running walk will naturally tend to decrease the depth of the nod... A horse simply cannot maintain the deeper movement in the lesser time allowed at the faster tempo. Just as you will not swing your arms as far when you increase your walking tempo, only as you extend your stride at the slower tempo. First you must establish fundamental training and communication with your horse.
Your first training goal will be to teach your horse to rate himself... to move to your tempo at all times... allowing you to be the leader of the dance.
Utilizing these basic principles, you can get more and more brilliance, stride and headnod from your correctly moving walking horse. Tension in the top line is your enemy, so when working in an arena or walking for miles on the trail will help the horse to relax and drive while keeping it neutral and energy efficient. So now if you hear someone say, "if he ain’t noddin’, he ain’t walkin’" you can understand what they mean. Any horse will nod in a neutral walking frame, but the long stride of the walking horse makes it a show. Anita Howe
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trunk of the body for humans. The more power a horse needs to drive his walk the more he will counterbalance with the most movable portion of his anatomy...his head and neck pendulum. We all know that the power of a gait comes from the backend of a horse. With the power needed on one end, while the shoulders (bearing a majority of the weight) become his pivot point, the head and neck become his counterbalance. This is why a correctly walking horse's headnod should always be in rhythm with his "backend stride".
