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As with anything, control is more of a training issue than a "pain
factor" issue.

My finished arabian gelding was trained from the ground up in a
bitless bridle, and even when he has an arab moment, the bitless has
MORE than enough control. He did the OD 25 several years ago as a five
year old, first ride ever for him, first exposure to large quantities
of horses on the trail, and did excellent.

Now, if you take a horse that has been trained using a bit, and try to
put him in a bitless, you have a real toss up - some might respect it,
some might ignore it, and some might listen "when they want to". To
get good results you will want to go back to square one and RETRAIN
the horse to respond to cues from the bitless, not just slap it on and
expect it to work, which is what I hear a lot of.

And some horses just might not be keen on it at all. I have a little
TWH gelding who I started with a bitless. He is such a lughead though,
that he just walks right through it (a mariachi band could pop up next
to him out of the blue, and he wouldn't twitch a bun..he's just that
calm/lazy/indifferent)...I use a french link snaffle on him with great
results.

My experience has shown that hotter/more sensitive horses are easily
trained using the bitless bridle, whereas the lugheads are less likely
to notice that it even exists, let alone is a communication device
that they are supposed to listen to. But if that hot horse has already
been trained using a bit, retraining will not necessarily be as
effective as if he had been started with it.

~S



On 5/20/06, Nik Isahak Abdullah <drnikisahak@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Can someone in the know comment on this issue of Bitless Briddle with
> respect to endurance.I have an American expatriate email friend in Kuala
> Lumpur who is in dressage and does hacking with her horses which I presume
> is non arab,probably warmblood or thoroughbred.She is full of praise of the
> change in behaviour of her horses and better control.This is not the
> hackemore nor the bossal type of bitless briddle.
> Anyone has experience with this.Since it is relatively appear painless for
> the horse  I am quite worried about the degree of control one have over the
> horses especially at the start of a ride.
>
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