The Katmah Experience

From they day we start riding we were told to get our heels down as far as we can. Keeping the heels down and the toes up is a common thing to want to instil into a new rider, mainly for safety reasons. Us riders spend most of our time functioning off of the ball of our foot in the stirrup. Though it’s common to see even the most advanced riders jamming their heels down and keeping them that way. The forced rigidity in keeping the heels down this way is not necessarily a benefit to us in the tack (or in the rest of life).

Lets start with a brief anatomy lesson.

There is a whole bunch of stuff in the foot and ankle, but the joint we want to focus on today is the “subtalar joint” which is the joint that moves the foot/ankle into “dorsiflexion” (heels down) and…