Stride Efficiency Continued

Blog is back.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ud_XPH6Eix4

from the :55 to the 2:26. Near the 5.5f showing the nice strides of Regal Ransom and the #2 horse Rip Van Winkle, and the more upright nicely striding Colonel John. Avoid for the present the (seminal) Q as to why these enthusiastic nicely striding horses suffer quail death in the stretch. At the :55 mark they look like they'll be hard to catch.

And, world class jocks with their riding styles. Mostly sitting chilly with Colonel John's jock perfectly over the center of gravity and variations of the over the center of gravity position from the others--some better/some worse.

Are these riders doing anything to get these nice strides? Jock involvement in the horse's stride? Anything stride related the jocks are doing? And, deeper analysis, how would these same horses look running with a bad stride, or an inefficient stride. What would be different (if anything)?
The Q was posed, if we're going to talk about optimal stride for our horse, is it necessary to first understand the concept.

Einstein's jock (red stripes on sleeves) looks to be pushing on the neck a little more than the others. The body of the jocks are still over the center of gravity, but each jock has a little different version of forearm motion on the reins. What's with that--hand motion going back and forth in tandem with the bit in the horse's mouth as the horse's head is bobbing up and down.

Observing these riders--anything else any of them is doing other than:

sitting still like a statute over the horse's center of gravity
forward-backward arm motion on the reins in rhythm with the head bobbing of the horse.

Watching these jocks closely there is nothing else visible that they are doing in this race riding at this point in the race. Down the home stretch there is of course much added motion.

Are the jocks possibly doing anything that we're unable to see in a vid, e.g. with their hands on the reins. U hear jocks brag they have superior hands. What, goes on with the hands in terms of stride?

Keeping focus on "stride efficiency" I can answer these Qs only with my own experience and what I hear here and there. Qs I have asked, although to date I have yet to ever persevere in questioning a jock about riding technique. Whenever I started such a conversation--how do u do this and that, they mostly seem reluctant to speak, and what comes out is primarily gobbly gook. There's a reason for that which goes right on with my explanation---like the expert fiddler, these jocks are unable to verbalize how they do what they do because there is a multiplicity of combinations that lend themselves poorly to explanation.

But, I'll give it a stab, next post.

Training:
mostly off with pasture romps. On our horse after I get this mythical horse around the race track.