Are there any studies on the effects of Rollkur?

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Corona

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I know it's always a hot topic and there is a post a few threads below regarding that horrific (my opionion) video "blue tongue", but i've actually been wondering for a while whether there are any studies which have been done to look at the actual practice? Not biased ones maybe some scientific studies looking at the impact, possible pro's, cons and anatomical distresses it causes, that sort of thing? I alwyas find lots of opinions on it but never much about its actual effect and what impact it has on certain muscles and so on.

Sorry this is probably pointless, im just curious!
 
well, Gerd Heuschmann is a vet as well as a dressage rider, and he is totally against it (read Tug of War if you can). I doubt he came to his conclusions without a lot of thought, investigation, and evidence.
i had a conversation by pms about this and extreme stretching with someone who used to do martial arts to a high level, who said his teacher would not let them do extreme stretches (which rollkur is) for more than a few seconds at a time, and that to do it for extended periods would have been excruciating.
i was told the reason for using rollkur, other than the fact that it makes a huge powerful animal controllable by a slight rider (learned helplessness, anyone?) is that it squashes a certain muscle in the chest/top of front leg area, and when worked while squashed this muscle builds up artificially, and then aids in snatching the front legs really high to get that exaggerated goose-steppy movement so beloved of top-level judges at the moment - God only knows why.
sorry, rant over, must go and do stuff to calm down...
 
There was a really interesting one where they had two arenas, worked a group of WB's in both, one arena they did rolkur, one "normally." They had to enter the arenas by a "chute" and turn a specific way for each arena. Then they were put in the chute and left ot decided where to go. All but one went in the "normal" arena. I think thats pretty conclusive, just one of them was a bit dumb! lol Unfortunatly I can't remember who did it but it was done under scientific conditions and propperly studied. It was in H&H
 
BugseyZ, i read about that study, i'd forgotten it. i wonder if the one who preferred the rollkur arena was a dumblood?!
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Hi Corona,

there are only a few paper out there I believe that looked at the Rollkur scientifically. There was the "arena study" mentioned above, which showed if I remember rightly that the horses disliked being ridden in the rollkur mannner. (Sorry, can't find the reference).

There also a couple of studies around which suggest the rollkur is beneficial to the horses wellfare, surprisingly there are out of Holland; References below if you like to look them up:

Workload and stress in horses: comparison in horses ridden deep and round (“rollkur”) with a draw rein and horses ridden in a natural frame with only light rein contact.
MM Sloet van Oldruitenborgh-Oosterbaan, MB Blok, L Begeman, MC Kamphuis, MC Lameris, AJ Spierenburg, MJ Lashley.
Tijdschr Diergeneeskd. (2006) 131, 152 - 157.


A non-natural head-neck position (rollkur) during training results in less acute stress in elite trained dressage horses.
E van Breda.
J Applied Animal Welfare Science (2006) 9, 59 - 64.
 
yes there are studies, which have seemed to imply so far that rollkur does not have negative effects - which was taken from the Sloet Van Oldruitenborgh-Oosterbaan et al. (2006) study that tangotime has mentioned,
in this study, they also note that horses performing in the Rollkur position had a "better way of going".....

Marianne (Sloet van...) and her team regularly present on numerous topics, including this one, world wide - so I don't think this is confined to Holland - but there is the large equine research centre in Utrecht which does a lot of research into all kinds of topics, however, if there is a greater occurrence of rollkur in holland, then where else are you going to do the research but holland?

I liked to enquire as to who hasn't worked their horses in a very rounded & overcollected position for a while to improve their way of going through the neck, back and hindquarters, like increasing collection through a canter and then releasing, ok it's not Rollkur as we're not riding elite horses, but it working along similar principles for more novice horses isn't it?

i think on with so little actual evidence so far (for both for/against) it'll become clearer as time progresses and it's studied more, the danger of jumping on the band wagon after one horse is shown to have problems and is also ridden in rollkur as it's "different" to "normal" practices,
also we should stay away from the tendency to link it to human athletic practices, we're different to horses anatomy and what we consider as painful, horses don't, for example, if i had to itch the back of my heel with my mouth I think i'd be in a lot of pain as I don't move that way, however, a horse will do it without thinking, ....it's a basic comparison....

just food for thought
 
I looked into Rollkur for part of my degree and found a fair few studies, though fairly limited in the grand scheme of things.

The evidence seemed to suggest that Rollkur isn't actually as detrimental to horses in physical terms as many would make out, however there are as yet no longitudinal studies. If i remember rightly some studies also showed that horses showed less signs of distress when being ridden 'LDR'. These horses were being ridden by very good riders though and were athletic horses - so not comparible with the average horse and rider combi. deciding to take up Rollkur as a training method.

I had wanted to do my dissertation on Rollkur, to look specifically into whether or not it improved performance in terms of 'expression', judged by stride length and height of step in certain movements. Unfortunately i didn't have access to the right set-up to commit to this project.
 
Excuse my dumbness but what exactly is Rollkur ? Ive read reports in H&H about it being used in competition warm up with conflictling reports. Is it a gadget or style of riding ????
 
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Excuse my dumbness but what exactly is Rollkur ? Ive read reports in H&H about it being used in competition warm up with conflictling reports. Is it a gadget or style of riding ????

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It's a type of riding practiced by many Dutch riders, most notably by Anky.

It involves putting the horse in a hyper-flexed position, so that the neck is really curled, imagive the jaw touching the chest and riding forwards from there. This position is said to stretch the back and top of the neck muscles.

Re the more general discussion, it would also be interesting for someone to look into the effects of botched-Rollkur, i.e. what you see in the majority of cases where average riders attempt rollkur but forget all about impulsion.
 
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I liked to enquire as to who hasn't worked their horses in a very rounded & overcollected position for a while to improve their way of going through the neck, back and hindquarters, like increasing collection through a canter and then releasing, ok it's not Rollkur as we're not riding elite horses, but it working along similar principles for more novice horses isn't it?

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No, never have and never will. I've had some horses working absolutely beautifully under saddle though.
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Apart from the physical issues, or not, what about the mental?
 
Bugsey - I was going to post that link too

http://www.sustainabledressage.com/rollkur/why_not.php

I ended up looking for this when I was goggling damage to the nuchal ligament as we had a claim for a horse who was a terrible headshaker and investigations showed that it had osteophytes that had developed on the nuchal ligament causing a lot of discomfort. Don;t know how it had been caused but it appears the use of Rolkur causes pressure on this area (amongst others) that can result in this. Not nice at all!
 
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I liked to enquire as to who hasn't worked their horses in a very rounded & overcollected position for a while to improve their way of going through the neck, back and hindquarters, like increasing collection through a canter and then releasing, ok it's not Rollkur as we're not riding elite horses, but it working along similar principles for more novice horses isn't it?

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No, never have and never will. I've had some horses working absolutely beautifully under saddle though.
smile.gif

Apart from the physical issues, or not, what about the mental?

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Just because you're not riding elite horse doesn't stop the training method from being rollkur! Rollkur is just another word for hyperflexion, and if you work your horse with its head flexed down onto its chest and held in place there, then you are working your horse in hyperflexion. It isn't called Rollkur for Anky and something else for amateur riders. And TBH, whatever you call it, it's still a form of abuse.
 
Impact of riding in a coercively obtained Rollkur posture on welfare and fear of performance horses
Uta Ulrike von Borstela, b, , , Ian James Heatly Duncana, Anna Kate Shovellera, Katrina Merkiesd, Linda Jane Keelingb and Suzanne Theresa Millmanc

aDepartment of Animal and Poultry Science, University of Guelph, Guelph, Ont. N1G 2W1, Canada

bDepartment of Animal Environment and Health, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, PO Box 7038, 75007 Uppsala, Sweden

cDepartment of Population Medicine, University of Guelph, Guelph, Ont. N1G 2W1, Canada

dDepartment of Animal and Poultry Science, University of Guelph, Kemptville Campus, 830 Prescott Street, PO Box 2003, Kemptville, Ont. K0G 1J0, Canada


Accepted 13 October 2008. Available online 25 November 2008.

Abstract
Rollkur, the usually coercively obtained hyperflexion of the horse's neck, is employed as a training method by some dressage riders; however, its use is controversial as it may cause discomfort and adversely affect the horse's welfare. The objectives of this study were to determine: (1) if horses showed differences in stress, discomfort and fear responses as measured by heart rate and behaviour when ridden in Rollkur (R) obtained by pressure on the reins compared to regular poll flexion (i.e. with the nose-line being at or just in front of the vertical; N), and (2) if they showed a preference between the two riding styles when given the choice. Fifteen riding horses were ridden 30 times through a Y-maze randomly alternating between sides. Riding through one arm of the Y-maze was always followed by a short round ridden in R, whereas riding through the other arm was followed by a short round ridden in N. Immediately after the conditioning phase, horses were again repeatedly ridden into the maze; however, riders left it to the horse to decide which arm of the maze to enter. During R, horses moved slower and showed more often behavioural signs of discomfort, such as tail-swishing, head-tossing or attempted bucks (P < 0.05), and 14 of the 15 horses chose significantly (P < 0.05) more often the maze-arm associated with N rather than R. Subsequently, eight of the horses were also subjected to two fear tests following a short ride in N as well as a ride in R. During R, horses tended to react stronger (P = 0.092) to the fear stimuli and to take longer (P = 0.087) to approach them. These findings indicate that a coercively obtained Rollkur position may be uncomfortable for horses and that it makes them more fearful and therefore potentially more dangerous to ride. Further studies need to assess horses’ reaction to gradual training of Rollkur, as opposed to a coercively obtained hyperflexion, in order to decide whether the practice should be banned.

Keywords: Horse; Coercive riding; Welfare; Rollkur; Fear; Training
 
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Who are you talking to Chesnut Cob? You've copied my post, where I said I have never ridden my horses as described.
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Whoever you'd quoted but I thought your points were interesting as well. Not aimed at you as I know you hadn't said that
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