“I’m very lucky that the Micklem bridle is such a success because it’s loved by horses. Since people realise that horses are more comfortable and they go better since they realise that they’re loved. They say ‘I love them’ as well.”

When the Micklem Multibridle, made by Horsewear, first arrived on the market, most people didn’t see the point or thought it was ugly or non-traditional. It appealed mostly to the crunchy bitless riding brigade. Sure what would the judges think if you trotted in with a dirty great ring on the front of your noseband? But with a few small changes, it became the Micklem Competition Bridle, no lunging ring on the front, better leather quality and more colour options. The first real innovation in bridles for possibly hundreds of years, within a few years the bridle had exploded in popularity! 

That was over 10 years ago now, and since then nearly every brand has at least one version of an ‘anatomical bridle’. Any event rider worth their salt has at least one Micklem bridle in the tack room, and at the grassroots level it is to be seen at every show and in every yard. 

SP: Can you tell me about the origin of The Micklem Bridle and how do you feel about the trend for anatomical bridles that has followed in the last decade and really taken over?

WM: “My bridle was based initially on ‘can you do it in a more simple fashion?’. I went to a lecture when I was a 10 year old boy at the pony club, and I learned about the fact that the horse’s upper jaw is wider than his lower jaw. And I realised then that what a lot of people were doing with their nosebands attached to the bridle was very uncomfortable for the horse. I also learned about the nerves at the top of the horse’s head and of course the brain is just below the top of the horse’s head. That’s where every single nerve originates, is just below the horse’s poll. And I learned about what you could do to make a horse submit by putting pressure on the nerves and I said, ‘well, we’re not doing the right thing with our bridles!’ “

“I did mess around with different ideas and it was always something in my head and then in my early 20s, I suppose I started making my first Micklem bridle. And so this was a long time ago. And then about 30 years ago, I thought I had the answer. You know, this is it, the Micklem bridle. I made it the multi-bridle because it was easy to add a ring in the nose to do the lunging. So it could be a lunge bridle and ride bridle and I also made it so you could go bitless so that was an attraction, but I couldn’t get anybody interested.“

“I had taken it to a number of people and one of the people I took it to was Tom McGuinnes of Horseware Ireland. And initially, he thought No. And then he rang me about five years later and said let’s have another look at the bridle. And so that was in 2005, I think. And the next year it won the innovation award at BETA, the trade fair, and it’s just gone from strength to strength. I mean it is the top-selling individual bridle in the world. “

“Of course, there are always lots of people who are copying it and making changes, small changes to it. Which commercially is difficult. But from my point of view, it’s wonderful that people are thinking about more comfortable nosebands, more comfortable bridles for the horse and particularly overcoming the problem where the upper jaw teeth are wider than the lower jaw teeth.”

“There are also various nerves that come out underneath a cranked noseband. You know, [the crank is] to tighten those nosebands, which I abhor. And you put pressure on those nerves and what you’re doing is actually ending up numbing the area around the lower part of the head and around the mouth where we put the bit, so horses pick fights. With flash noseband and crank noseband particularly, you will find that you’re numbing the area where the bit is so it’s not helpful at all.“

“So [with my bridle] I avoid extra pressure on the top of the head. I avoid any inward pressure over the teeth where the majority of teeth are. I avoid those nerves that I’m talking about and I avoid having the noseband really low. To which I’d say low drop nosebands, in my opinion should be banned. They’re just nothing but cruelty. 

“…And that was the Micklem bridle. Now initially it was marketed as a multi-bridle with the lunging and with the bitless bridle as well. Probably in some ways it was a mistake because it was a jump too far. But now people are understanding it. So it was when we did the competition version, that could only be used as a bridle; That’s when it really took off and all credit to Tom McGuinness and all credit to Horseware Ireland for giving it a chance.”

“The keyword is love. And of course, I’m very lucky that that’s why the Micklem bridle is such a success because it’s loved by horses. Since people realise that horses are more comfortable and they go better since they realise that they’re loved. They say ‘I love them’ as well.”

SP: Do you see any common fitting mistakes or mistakes that people make using it as a riding bridle?

WM: “The most common mistake with the bridle is fitting it too low. The nosepiece needs to be viewed as halfway between a low drop noseband and the cavesson noseband.”

“Interestingly, it’s been used in racing recently. There’s a horse called Saffron Beach which won a group 1 event,  and then won on the flat at Ascot wearing a Micklem bridle. So it’s the racing people who realise that it’s more comfortable. Sheikh Muhammad was a fan of it. 

“Most people don’t realise that a loose ring snaffle is actually a type of gag. So the bigger loose ring that you have, the more upward movement there is of the mouthpiece. That’s why it was called a racing snaffle because they wanted more control of their horses. So it was more powerful if you like it, and had more effect on the horse. But of course what happens with a loose ring snaffle; and the same thing happens with a three ring, and the three ring gag is the most popular bit in the world. It’s popular because it lifts the mouthpiece up, and rolls it back, but it [the three-ring gag and loose ring] also splits the corners of the mouth.”

“So in racing, you will find that a huge number of horses are ridden in egg but snaffles not in loose ring snaffle. It is done to reduce the splits in the horse’s mouth. I would say that I try to stop people using three or four ring snaffles with big big Shanks because of the huge outward pressure that there is in splitting the corners, and of course in his mouth.

Another thing that I tell people [about bits] is the fact that the horse’s lower jaw is actually quite narrow. The horse’s tongue is wider than the bars of the mouth. So there’s the bottom of the mouth, you put the bars on top of it and then you put the tongue next and then on top of the tongue is the bit. When I tell people to look at the mouth, a lot of people look at the inside of the cheeks, very few look under the tongue. And so you put pressure on a bit, especially when you put pressure on the bit that puts pressure on the tongue, which puts pressure on the bars of the mouth which are very narrow. So a lot of horses immediately get very uncomfortable underneath their tongue. Because it is like a razor blade at the mouth. So they then start pressing with their tongue or even lifting the tongue over the bit, and of course when the tongue gets above the bit, when the bit gets against the bars of the mouth, it’s even more uncomfortable. 

“So what I do is I actually link the front of the snaffle, the rings of the snaffle to the main rings [on the noseband] in front of the bit on my bridle, so that takes some of the pressure onto the nose. So all my young horses started like that and we will add Festina Lente in Bray. Most of the more novice riders will either ride bitless or they will ride with those links. So there’s not that excessive pressure with the tongue on the bars of the mouth, which is why so many horses get uncomfortable.”

SP: Yeah, that’s something I’m sort of learning more and more about my own horse. He’s always been very fussy in the mouth. Recently I borrowed a Micklem competition bridle. And while he would have always gone either in a figure-eight or drop nosebands and quite tight because he just moved his mouth so much. Mostly I was trying to keep the bit still; I found he liked the Micklem noseband quite loose and he was very happy in it.

WM: You see there you’re a good horse person because you experiment and you allow yourself to make mistakes and that’s such a key part of horse riding. We should be open to making mistakes. It sounds a strange thing for me to say.

SP: Oh, I’ve fallen over in front of lessons.

WM: It’s very, very, very important that we, if you like, cherish our failures, all the time. And that we make changes, we experiment, we listen, we see what the reactions are from the horse. I think that’s super important. To get it right you need to get it wrong as well. Because you mustn’t be afraid of getting it wrong. You mustn’t be afraid of experimenting and that’s one of the things the country as a whole, the industry as a whole, needs to learn.