Riding bitless and barefoot

Do you like this style of riding?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVxZzbpTZ80

That's a great exercise to get a horse soft and responsive. It's good when using a bit too.

I've trained our TWH, Lucy, bitless from the beginning. She's only had a bit in her mouth once and that was just to see if she would accept it. It was never used. She's not as good or even close to that horse in the vid but I don't ride her very much. She's more of a pasture ornament because of her injuries after her birth.

Our other horses use bits but we can also ride them in just a halter and lead rope. Just not as much control.
Posted via Mobile Device

Yea I ride that way a lot plus none of my geldings have ever had shoes on. I ride all of my geldings in halter and they listen just fine, I like that way beeter for the winter so they don't have cold bits in their mouths.

I can ride most of my horses with a leadrope around their necks, the younger/hotter ones I can ride with a halter and then once they're relaxed a bit more, I can go to the leadrope. And they're never shoed. Except for the one time my mare somehow managed to crack her front hoof really bad, so we had her shoed in the front till it grew out.

I actually really want to buy a bridle like the one in the video to start my two fillies in.

Bitless bridle website: The Bitless Bridle by Dr. Robert Cook, FRCVS, Ph.D.

Does anybody know why the guy drop his rein several times?
Seems quite strange to me...

^^ Do you mean let go with his second hand? That's the only dropping that I see. It's to give the horse a clear signal of release.
Posted via Mobile Device

Is that a western ride?

It looks like to me as if the guy hadn't choose between western riding and english riding...

Maybe when you drop the rein, it's a clear signal of release, but I can't see how one could be clear when you need to pick up the rein again...

Giving a big or exaggerated release gets the horse to become softer. If you look closely, he only lifts his hand outward without pulling directly on the horse unless the horse doesn't respond. The horse feels the change in the rein and responds. Since he's not really pulling on the rein or making contact, he needs to exaggerate his release so the horse can feel the difference.

It looks like an English saddle but does that mean he has to ride with constant contact? Maybe he's more comfortable in an English saddle and training it for someone that rides western. The horse has good form and is responding well so why put pressure on his face?
Posted via Mobile Device

By the way this horse is an American trotter. At first it was trained to be a trotter, but wasn´t fast enough. So this man has trained this horse himself and it is quite a good riding horse.

The horse is 11 years old now.

My riding companion, too