Are uniformly loose nosebands the answer to horse sport’s image problems, or ‘the beginning of the end’?
In her next H&H subscriber-exclusive investigation into issues affecting horse sport today, Pippa Cuckson outlines how nosebands have become a focus of welfare advocates and why the FEI’s new noseband tightness measuring tool is splitting opinions of riders, officials and others
Back in October I wrote that there is nothing so polarising as the double bridle debate, but things move fast in the world of social licence. Just a few days later, nosebands became the new hot topic, with the announcement of the approved FEI noseband tightness measuring tool to be used on horses at international shows and events across all the disciplines.
The noseband – or rather, the fitting of it – has become a pariah over the past decade or so. Some research suggests tight nosebands are harmful; other research has found that very loose or no nosebands create problems of their own by allowing the rest of the bridle and bit to move too easily out of place. But the general public is now worried about potentially abusive equipment – and this is prodding the FEI to introduce controls that previously researchers and vets have advocated for without success.
Mandatory tightness checks with the tool at international shows (under Art 1044.8 of the 2025 FEI Veterinary Regulations, see page 45) were meant to start on 1 January but have been postponed till 1 May, to give time to train officials and distribute the measuring tool around the world. This is a major logistical challenge though the FEI told H&H they are “on target”. The tool is being made by a major French supplier of plastic components, Groupe Plastivaloire.
Nonetheless the new rule has caught many by surprise, despite being approved by the FEI General Assembly at the end of 2023. Consultation documents show remarkably few objections were lodged at the time, only by the International Dressage Riders Club (IDRC) dressage officials and the German and Irish national equestrian federations – just two of the 136 member countries entitled to a view. GB was in support – and will also trial the tool at British Dressage shows this season.
Anyone failing the test can start their competition if the noseband is loosened to comply with the rules. But if the noseband is found to have been covertly re-tightened again on the field of play, there is non-appealable elimination plus a yellow warning card. In disciplinary terms, therefore, the FEI now regards tight nosebands as more serious than certain instances of blood on the horse (which may be allowed to continue following inspection) or “excessive” use of the whip in eventing and jumping (disqualification and warnings being at the ground jury’s discretion).
But only now, with just three months to go, is the FEI facing resistance from all sides – for different and seemingly incompatible reasons.
The FEI approved tool is a slim black plastic wedge passed under the noseband and (front) nasal bone from top to bottom, for a no-quibble pass or fail (see video below). Some riders don’t want the testing done at all. Others in both dressage and jumping accept the rule is in place but think elimination is too draconian, or don’t like the procedure. Officials are worried about this additional task, when they already have limited time for existing mandatory checks on horses that may be raring to go.
Meanwhile, welfare campaigners welcome mandatory testing in principle, as one would expect. But there is dismay that the FEI has not adopted the tapered tool developed by the International Society for Equitation Science (ISES), which demands a looser fitting noseband. ISES is a “who’s who” of global equine veterinary and research expertise and its noseband tool has been used in many peer-reviewed studies, including by the UK-based team at Centaur Biomechanics as part of the FEI tool development process.
The new rule is also dividing senior figures in the governance of global equestrianism (see more below). This week Theo Ploegmakers, president of the European Equestrian Federation (EEF) publicly warned riders to stop complaining, claiming there are “numerous reports of excessively tight nosebands”.
A look back at nosebands in history
Portraits and sculptures from the Middle Ages to classical times rarely show a horse with a noseband. There is some evidence of noseband use many thousands of years ago, fastened directly over the nostrils to control the horse by impeding its breathing.
In the early renaissance, when equitation developed as an art form, nosebands lined with chains or other sharp objects were used to help “collect” the horse before the curb bit had fully evolved.
For several hundred years the plain cavesson became universal, whatever the bit/s. It also had a useful halter/tying-up function. The standing martingale was invented to be attached to a cavesson, to stop horses throwing their heads too high – a popular solution for excitable horses in the hunting field. For others, the presence of a cavesson was simply cosmetic – riders became so used to it that a bare-faced horse somehow looked under-dressed.
There were no significant variations until the late 19th century when Ernst Seidler of the Spanish Riding School of Vienna invented the “dropped” noseband which had a more focussed action with the bit. In due course, the two-strap “flash” noseband combined both cavesson and drop.
Sometimes a noseband’s name describes its effect graphically; the crank noseband indeed has a levered type of fastening. Others are less obvious. The grakle is named after the strong-pulling 1931 Grand National winner, invented to stop him crossing his jaw. This figure of eight noseband gives a very concentrated pressure on the nasal bone; many reading this will have used a grakle routinely over the years for fast work, cross-country riding and/or showjumping. It is now also permissible in certain levels of dressage.
Around the world it became received wisdom that comfort should be checked by inserting two fingers – however slender or fat – between the noseband and the cheeks – a soft, more yielding part of the horse’s head than the nasal bone. Two fingers were first mentioned in The Pony Club Manual of Horsemanship in 1956.
The cavesson, increasingly supplied with wider and thicker dimensions, now comes under the suspicion of welfare lobbyists, especially in dressage. They cite the growing body of work that shows a tight cavesson can cause discomfort and increased stress levels in itself. Yet it continues to be fitted tight by some to stop the horse opening its mouth during the dressage test, deemed a sign of poor training and hence reduced scores.
Moreover by impeding mouth-opening, a tight noseband can conceal the very internal injuries such as oral lesions, soft tissue compression damage and blue tongues that it may have helped to cause in the first place.
Conversely, respected researchers such as Dr Rachel Murray have previously studied loose nosebands and found that more pressure has been created on a horse’s mouth, because greater rein tension was then needed to create the same desired outcome.
There is growing concern too that some horses strain so hard against a tight noseband that they sustain microfractures in the nasal bone. Another renowned researcher, Prof Paul McGreevy of the University of Sydney co-authored a study in 2020 involving 144 horses at the Mexican cavalry’s high performance competition centre, used for dressage and jumping. In the vicinity of the noseband, X-rays identified bone thinning in 37% of the study group. Bone deposition (where the bone re-generates to repair breakage or damage) was detected in 80% when each of the 144 horses was palpated separately two clinicians, neither of whom knew the purpose of the study. There was a smaller incidence of damage in the lower jaw.
Prof McGreevy said there were no direct causal connections. “But these findings are critical to the advance of ethical equitation that advocates a three-step process for equestrian stakeholders who seek to retain the social licence to operate. It demands that we identify the causes of distress in the horses we ride, that we mitigate these stressors as much as possible, and that we justify the retention of those that cannot be mitigated.”
Data from a new study into noseband-related microfractures is awaiting analysis, H&H understands.
Measuring tool trials and tribulations
Because of the variety of finger sizes, around 2012 ISES devised an objective measuring gauge based on two “average” adult fingers. The ISES tool is a green plastic elongated triangle, inserted from below between the noseband and the (front) nasal bone; to “pass” the lower ledge of the noseband must marry up with a marker point without force. The latest version incorporates templates for bit circumference.
But shortly after its release, the International Dressage Riders Club (IDRC) circulated a petition against measuring, saying there was already provision for stewards to consult the FEI vet over any concerns.
In 2016, one particularly large study led by Dr Orla Doherty of University College, Dublin, found that only 7% of the nosebands worn by 737 international dressage and jumping horses passed the two finger test, and 44% had no room to squeeze anything underneath. But the FEI avoided the issue of noseband testing until the escalating pressure of social licence and the more recent recommendations of its own ethics commission – chaired by Prof Natalie Waran, a founding member of ISES – made objective assessment of tightness unavoidable.
In previous position statements about nosebands, ISES has urged the FEI to adopt the precautionary principle: “where any doubts that may exist in any situation surrounding horse welfare, the outcome should favour the interests of the horse until such time that research reveals there to be no welfare risk”.
So far ISES has not commented on the FEI’s choice. However, one well respected ISES member Cristina Wilkins says it allows 23% less space than the ISES tool and 24% less than the average two adult fingers. “So much for tradition!” she added. “I wish stewards all the best using the pull-through tool. I hope horses don’t start anticipating the pressure increase as it goes through with a bit of a bump.”
A FEI spokesman said: “One of the key aspects was that [the FEI tool] be minimalistic in shape and colour, user-friendly and well tolerated by horses. It was specifically designed as a pass-through tool that is not extracted against the growth of the hair, and with no need for the additional visual check whether the tool has been inserted to the required stop mark.
“We did not want to incorporate additional features such as measurement of the bit size as it would impact the size of the tool.”
The FEI did not explain why the space allowed is smaller than the ISES tool. The rationale has though been set out by the researchers involved.
For obvious practical reasons, most noseband studies have been done while the horse is standing still, and there is still more to be understood about the effects of rein tension and any changes when the horse is moving.
Last year Centaur Biomechanics examined horses in trot, as well as standing and eating a treat, variously wearing cavesson, drop, flash and crank nosebands. Readings from pressure mats on the face found that reducing the “slack” under between noseband and (front) nasal bone from a two to 1.5 finger space “did not significantly increase pressure on the horse’s head and was not within a range at which pain or tissue damage would be expected to occur”.
Will one size fit all?
While dressage is the main subject of public scrutiny, nosebands will be measured in all FEI disciplines.
The official FEI video (shown above) shows a horse wearing a flash noseband. There are no publicly available guidelines about its efficacy with the multi-component or hybrid noseband/bit set-ups popular in the jumping disciplines.
Eventing riders and officials have less access to the FEI rules consultation process than the dressage and show jumping community, because no eventing stakeholder groups currently have a Memorandum of Understanding with the FEI.
Andy Griffiths, chairman of the International Eventing Officials Club, was supportive of any welfare initiative but worried about the additional burden on officials “who are, after all, volunteers”. He pointed out they are responsible for the smooth running of three different phases over a weekend and will have to find time to test horses in each phase as each horse may be using two or three different bridles during their competition.
Making a drama out of a crisis?
At the recent International Jumping Riders Club (IJRC) annual meeting, the FEI’s head of jumping Todd Hinde revealed that just three nosebands of 600 failed when tested with the new tool at a CSI in Belgium last summer. This caused IJRC president Francois Mathy jnr to caution the FEI against allowing the public to think tight nosebands are rife.
“I would like to trust a little bit more the horsemanship of the stewards, and then use the device if needed to settle a disagreement,” Mr Mathy said. “But if we test every horse in every class at every show, and make it into a drama, we send a message to the public that everyone must be tightening it too much.”
Former Olympic showjumping champion Ludger Beerbaum flagged up the need to educate and inform the public, rather than to demonise equipment or lay blame with one discipline, assuring the dressage riders that “we are in this together”. A well-fitted bridle stabilises the bit to ensure riders communicate aids “in the right doses”, he said.
“Now we are destroying this, only because a vet or horse welfare people are saying that we need this wide-open noseband, so the horses can play with the tongue, and the jaw is going left and right. Of course, we don’t want a super-tight noseband, but the goal of a noseband is to be productive.
“If we continue like this in five years time we will be talking about not riding with a bridle, and a rope around the neck. This is the beginning of the end, I am telling you.”
Opinions are sharply divided in the corridors of power, too.
Two influential figures, Stephan Ellenbruch and Klaus Roeser, have called for a re-think over the testing protocol.
Mr Ellenbruch is a FEI board member and chair of the FEI jumping committee. He has heard many concerns about the procedure from stewards, and wondered if the consultation process had been ushered through “a little too fast”.
He said: “We will not be able to delay this [noseband testing] significantly, and we will not be able to change the rule because it is a decision of the FEI General Assembly. But I really do think we should sit down with the jumping and dressage riders, to find a compromise about the procedure. This is the minimum we should try to achieve, and I know I won’t be popular within the FEI with this proposal.”
Mr Roeser is secretary general of the IDRC, chairman of the German national dressage committee, a board member at the EEF and member of the newly announced FEI dressage strategic group. In December he bluntly criticised the testing protocol and the alleged lack of information available last year from FEI HQ. He said it was a “joke” that stakeholders were given 8 January as a deadline to feedback on the tool when no-one could obtain a sample.
He thinks testing should be over the cheeks, using two fingers, not the gauge: “otherwise we have this stupid, loose noseband which in dressage is much more of a problem than for other disciplines.”
But EEF president Theo Ploegmakers says rider resistance to noseband testing “is shortsighted and poses a danger to horse welfare”.
He added: “Even experts can make mistakes: while top riders may have significant experience, they are not infallible. They can misjudge a situation, succumb to pressure to perform, or make decisions influenced by personal biases or emotions.
“Lack of oversight invites abuse. Without standardised rules, there is no mechanism to prevent or address mistreatment. The assumption that expertise guarantees ethical behaviour is risky, as not all riders may prioritise horse welfare above success or financial gain.”
Read more H&H exclusive news investigations from Pippa Cuckson
Why we are seeing blue tongues in dressage arenas – and what needs to be done about it
The history of hyperflexion in dressage training – and how the sport can move away from it
The double bridle debate – the facts, the opinions… and the politics
How horse abuse is penalised in sport – and the challenges of bringing a case before the FEI Tribunal
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