05/06/2026
Drop your stirrups. It is a simple instruction that riding instructors should give regularly. If no stirrup work is done correctly, it is one of the fastest and most effective ways to build an independent seat, develop core stability, and create the kind of deep balanced position that carries over into everything a rider does in the saddle. Some riders dread the thought of no stirrups but the problem is not the exercise. It is how it gets used.
The most important point about no stirrup work is that quality beats quantity every single time. A rider who grips, tenses, and white knuckles their way through thirty minutes without stirrups is not building strength, they are building bad habits.
1. Exhausted muscles do not learn correct movement so they compensate.
Compensation patterns built under fatigue are genuinely difficult to undo. The goal is never to survive no stirrup work. The goal is to use it so effectively that the rider barely realizes how much they are improving.
2. Start with one stirrup before you drop both.
This is one of the most underused progressions in no stirrup work and one of the most effective. Ask your student to drop just the left or inside stirrup and ride for five to ten minutes. Then switch - right stirrup dropped, left stirrup in. Riding with a single stirrup isolated each side of the body independently and reveals asymmetries in balance and strength that riding with both stirrups or neither, completely masks. A student who rides beautifully with both stirrups in and falls apart on one side without one has just shown you exactly where the work needs to happen.
3. When you do drop both stirrups start short.
Five minutes of genuinely quality no stirrup work at the walk and trot is worth more than thirty minutes of gripping and bouncing. Start with five minutes. Let the quality be the standard not the duration. When the quality drops and you will see it before the rider feels it, put the stirrups back. Rest and maybe go again. Progressive intervals of quality work build strength far faster than grinding through exhaustion and the rider finishes the lesson with good movement patterns reinforced rather than tension patterns locked in.
4. Know when to stop.
The moment you see a gripping knee, a braced hip, excessive bounce, or a lower back that has stopped following the movement the no stirrup work is done for that session. These are not signs to push through!! They are signals that the muscles have reached their productive limit and anything beyond that point is building tension not strength. Tired muscles build fitness. Exhausted muscles build problems so know the difference and act on it.
5. Build it progressively across your curriculum.
No stirrup work at the walk should be established before no stirrup work at the trot. No stirrup trot should be solid before no stirrup canter is introduced and for many riders no stirrup canter is an advanced goal not a standard exercise. Build the progression deliberately. A student who has developed genuine balance and stability at the walk and trot without stirrups will find the canter far more manageable when the time comes. A student pushed into no stirrup canter before they have the walk and trot foundation will grip, brace, and bounce in a way that is uncomfortable for them and unfair to the horse.
6. Use it as a teaching tool not a test of toughness.
No stirrup work is not a punishment and it is not an endurance event. It is a diagnostic and development tool that tells you where a rider’s balance actually lives when the stirrups are not there to prop it up and then gives you a way to build what is missing. Assign specific time limits.
Check in regularly about tension and fatigue. Have students put stirrups back when quality declines without making it feel like a failure. Focus on what they are feeling and where is the movement coming into your body, which side feels different, where are you holding tension, rather than just how long they can last without stirrups.
7. Do not forget the horse.
A tense bouncing rider without stirrups is not comfortable for the school horse carrying them. Monitor your horses during no stirrup sessions and be honest about when a rider’s fatigue is starting to affect the horse’s way of going. The horse’s comfort is part of the equation and a rider who understands that their tension has a direct impact on the horse beneath them is a rider who has a very good reason to do the work correctly.
How often is enough?
Three times per week of quality no stirrup work is plenty for most riders. The body needs recovery time between sessions and more frequent work without adequate recovery produces fatigue not fitness. Build it into your regular lesson curriculum as a standard component rather than a special event and your students will develop the seat security that comes from consistent progressive work over time without the dread that comes from treating it like a monthly ordeal.
No stirrup work is not about suffering. It is about building the kind of independent balanced seat that makes everything else in riding possible. Done correctly it is one of the best investments of lesson time you have. Done incorrectly it is just uncomfortable for everyone involved.
Use it well. Your students and their horses will thank you.
How do you incorporate no stirrup work into your lessons?
