08/12/2026
I had another drive with Bleu the Shire this morning. He's coming along nicely and I drove him walk and trot to warm up before handing the lines over to his owner. I went to snap the lunge line on because his current cart isn't designed for multiple people jand noticed something odd about the bridle.
One of the lines was attached to the sidepull ring on the noseband.
He felt perfectly fine while I was driving, dead even turning and stopping both ways, not an issue. A testament to his training (which did start in a sidepull). I remedied the line position, and his owner went on to have a nice lesson with him. We had a good laugh about it.
Training, not tack, controls the horse, and he probably would have gone just as well with both lines on the noseband.
While most people don't have a bridle with a bitless option on their driving horse, almost all driving bits have multiple options for the lines from the snaffle to various levels of leverage. I've caught lines being connected to different spots on the bit more than once, and not all horses are as gracious about it as Bleu was.
Before you get in: check our lines!
