Am i old fashioned

[Flowerofthefen]

In my thinking of working horses??

I believe that a horse should be fit enough for the work its expected to do. So why is it becoming a trend to not ride for months, maybe a short hack every Fortnight, then either go for a lesson or go competing ? I believe in little and often and I wouldn't dream of taking my horse out to do something strenuous if I hadn't built up to it. Is that old fashioned?

 

[Prancerpoos]

Depends on whether you like your horses to have intact tendons or not.

Seriously though, I wasn’t aware that that was now a ‘thing’.

 

[Flowerofthefen]

Depends on whether you like your horses to have intact tendons or not.

Seriously though, I wasn’t aware that that was now a ‘thing’.

Seems to be getting more popular round here!! Especially at this time of year. I was beggining to think I worry to much!

 

[Gloi]

Not old fashioned. Just passive aggressive

 

[Flowerofthefen]

Not old fashioned. Just passive aggressive

Why??
Its just an observation!!

 

[mini_b]

I don’t think it’s a trend.
a lot of folk are spread very thinly trying to afford their horse and upkeep and fit in what they can.

in fact, I had a clinic the other day with a lady who’s horse wasn’t fit enough to fully participate but it was good experience going out having a look at things and the instructor adjusted her needs slightly from the rest of the group. This is likely what many are doing!

winter is a crap time of year if you are juggling kids, horses, working and topping that off with a lack of facilities for some.

most people don’t deliberately set out to knacker their horses up.

 

[Kaylum]

If a horse isn't fit enough for a lesson and you are the instructor and you see the horse struggling its your responsibility to make sure you slow the lesson down or stop it. I would have thought that would be in the T&C of your contract with the rider/owner.

 

[teddypops]

Is it a thing? Who does this?

 

[dixie]

Actually I know of a couple who are like this and they are both “younger”. I wonder if it’s because they don’t grow up with horses or through the pony club like they used to, plus also social media pressure.
I’m also seeing quite a few videos of people schooling and jumping their 3yr olds which is alarming.

 

[OrangeAndLemon]

I think you're making an assumption about the lesson. My big lad was hacked a couple of times a week, schooled weekly and not suitable for a full on lesson but I wouldn't book a one hour lesson, I'd do 30 or 45 mins and I would tell the instructor we can't push him too hard. I'd finish early if I needed to.

I recently had a lesson and a friend lent me her older (fit) mare for it but we spent most of it in walk, just some trot. A lesson is about improving me to make me a better rider we can do that without pushing the horse harder than it is capable of.

 

[greenbean10]

One of my horses was always fit enough for the work he was doing, never overjumped, saddle checked every 6 months, physio every 8 weeks and in great condition yet I still am having to retire him at 8 due to everything going wrong. People do the best they can and horses break even when they do the right things.

 

[Jenko109]

There are lessons and there are lessons.

Ive taken unfit horses to group lessons before. Much of it is standing around and waiting your turn anyway. Ive also been to a group lesson and finished 20 minitues before the end having felt my horse had done enough.

 

[The Xmas Furry]

I like to make sure that we are fit enough for what I book onto.
Today was an hour sj. I knew the coach would keep things rolling along but there were 4 booked in so it shouldn't be too overly taxing.
On arrival I found 2 had pulled out. So towards the end, I had a word with the coach as I felt B was flagging a little and we had by then jumped all fences with some raised up by 10cm from where we started. I wanted to finish on a good note, so did.

Neighbour took 1 along to the session before mine and got v upset as their animal was stopping or knocking poles. He hadn't left the field for at least 3 weeks and has really only hacked at weekends since half term, poor sod was shattered mentally and physically.

OP, it's not being old fashioned, but I think it's a lack of thought and planning.

 

[ycbm]

In my thinking of working horses??

I believe that a horse should be fit enough for the work its expected to do. So why is it becoming a trend to not ride for months, maybe a short hack every Fortnight, then either go for a lesson or go competing ? I believe in little and often and I wouldn't dream of taking my horse out to do something strenuous if I hadn't built up to it. Is that old fashioned?

You have hit on a real bugbear of mine. I've seen horses which have not been exercised all week due to the dark taken out on a full drag hunt. (This can be fine well into the season, but not right at the start). I've heard one rider saying the horse had been taken out of a field for the first time in months that morning. The poor thing blew its top when it had had enough. I've been on camps with people who might ride their horses a couple of times a week and then expect them to do 3 days with two 90 minute sessions a day. I've overheard one participant say that the horse gets sore if it's ridden two days in a row yet expected it to do 3 days camp, ridden twice a day. I've known people who do a maximum of 5 miles at home go on 20 mile long distance rides. I've seen the raised eyebrows when I say my own horses aren't fit enough to do such and such an activity that others are going on.

Horses go wrong very easily if everything is done to the book. There's no sense in taking risks with injury like this.
.

 

[teapot]

I think there's a distinct lack of knowledge re fitness and correct fittening around at the moment.

Then naturally then impacts on saddle fit and they don't understand why and the cycle spirals...

 

[View]

It‘s been a gradual decline over the last forty years. Even then, we were looked at is if we had two heads because we fittened Paddy after his eight week summer holiday every year.

In many ways, more inexperienced people are able to own horses now, and may not be so receptive to advice on this subject. Added to which, the roads are a more dangerous place to ride these days.

I dropped one family because of what they expected me to do in lessons with their daughter and very unfit pony, who was never going to get any fitter on the 23 hours stabled regime and then being ragged round a school. Apparently I was unrealistic when I suggested a 30 minute lesson in walk while we started asking both pony and rider to work.

 

[PapaverFollis]

I find it amazing that people think this is not a thing! It very much is a thing in my experience. I think people have never tried to get themselves fit and/or don't have the empathy to understand that if running 3 miles without training feels rubbish for you then it also feels rubbish for your horse.

If I count up the people I have shared livery yard space with who *didn't* do this, who actually worked their horses with a good mind to fittening for the work required... I might possibly run out of fingers, maybe, but I wouldn't run out of toes. I've kept horses on seven different yards over the years...

 

[Spotherisk]

My horse was generally on diy with no school and I worked full time so he didn’t get ridden other than weekends, we would still go on an occasional pleasure ride BUT he was sane enough to go very steady, and we would pick the short route sometimes just 5k, to get out somewhere different. You can still ride an unfit horse of course, otherwise how do you get it fit, and you can still have fun without ragging it. He has been field kept as much as possible which I think helps rather than a lot of stabling.

 

[teddypops]

I find it amazing that people think this is not a thing! It very much is a thing in my experience. I think people have never tried to get themselves fit and/or don't have the empathy to understand that if running 3 miles without training feels rubbish for you then it also feels rubbish for your horse.

If I count up the people I have shared livery yard space with who *didn't* do this, who actually worked their horses with a good mind to fittening for the work required... I might possibly run out of fingers, maybe, but I wouldn't run out of toes. I've kept horses on seven different yards over the years...

I didn’t know this was a thing but then I’m on my own yard and I don’t really get involved in what anyone else is up to.

 

[poiuytrewq]

Someone told me a while ago that hunting her horse once a week kept and got him fit enough to hunt once a week. We are talking a whole day out not a quick hour.
I was gobsmacked.
Said horse got fit enough to hunt by cubbing weekly. Barely ever did anything otherwise

 

[Cazza525]

Just got me thinking that my horse, hacked for an hour 2 or three times a week is just ticking over this time of year….I hate December x

 

[bouncing_ball]

I’m obsessed with my horse being fit and well muscled. Through a wide variety of systematic and varied planned exercises. I think it’s a good safety net and fit horses are so much fun.

Don’t really notice what others do unless see horse obviously struggling. TBH I tend to ride before 9am and don’t see what others do later.

 

[bouncing_ball]

In my thinking of working horses??

I believe that a horse should be fit enough for the work its expected to do. So why is it becoming a trend to not ride for months, maybe a short hack every Fortnight, then either go for a lesson or go competing ? I believe in little and often and I wouldn't dream of taking my horse out to do something strenuous if I hadn't built up to it. Is that old fashioned?

its not old fashioned it is basic common sense whether for horse or human exercise.

I do think some people are in denial about how in frequently they exercise their horse over winter and don’t recognise the drop in work and reduce expectations accordingly.

 

[Cazza525]

Just got me thinking that my horse, hacked for an hour 2 or three times a week is just ticking over this time of year….I hate December x

Oh but mine live out as far as possible unless horrid! I don’t broom religiously overnight until January x

 

[MiJodsR2BlinkinTite]

As a fitness professional I know how important it is for the human body to be fit and conditioned enough to deal with any challenges placed upon it, so I am astounded to think that people could have such gung-ho attitudes to their horses as to think that you can do stuff like hunting with an unfit horse!

Then they wonder why their horses are constantly off with injuries.

Truly beggars belief.

 

[criso]

I'm not sure it's a new thing. When i waa a kid, no one had a school, floodlit or otherwise so our ponies were ridden at weekends in winter. Not much competing but what we did do was more intense - the occasional hunter trial and we did go hunting. Even in summer i don't remember people going up more than a couple of times a week after school or work, there was team training for the pony club one evening a week but i was doing tetrathalon so i was doing the other 3 disciplines on 2 other evenings. There was more turnout, 24/7 in summer and in at night in winter and the fields were huge and very hilly, this was South Devon, so maybe they moved around more without us.

 

[canteron]

Not old fashioned. Just passive aggressive

It’s not new, it’s not old, there is always a good supply of thoughtless people in every generation.

 

[palo1]

Yes and no! In our (UK/BHS) culture it is generally accepted that horses should be ridden 5 or 6 days a week with one rest day and that that routine will keep them fit. This is often applied all year round. There is an assumption that those work sessions will be varied, well managed and thought out! In endurance circles resting a horse after a strenuous event/ride is much more accepted and makes some sense physiologically. Advanced endurance horses (of the well managed kind) often do very little actual work if they are competing at weekends etc. In some other horse cultures horses are worked really differently. I have noticed here too some people ride 6 days a week but just kind of toddle along not doing a lot. Some people expect to do fast work and jumping or schooling 5 or 6 days a week but both of those scenarios are likely problematical I reckon if you suddenly expect a horse to do something different.

Horses stay fit really well, especially if they are healthy and turned out. Riding or working a horse more often than necessary or in a way that will put unnecessary stress on them will risk injury. Marathon runners/athletes do not go through a full 'event' style workout several times a week and nor should horses really. On the other hand plodding round a 2 mile block once or twice a week is never going to fitten and condition a horse for any kind of strenuous exercise.

Every year I want to get our horses fit by the end of summer and then use autumn to add to that. It means that they enter the winter in fit, hard condition and do NOT need hard work during the week; they are ridden at the weekend come rain or shine and will do several hours work at all paces. In the week they will probably work once or twice more; one of those sessions will be a longer slower ride, the other will be hills/schooling/faster work. The rest of the time they are turned out. This system of working fit horses as little as is necessary has kept our horses fit, happy and healthy for years and it means that when the days are short and the weather is grim the horses are still able to go out and do a clinic/competition/drag hunting etc. You have to put the work in at the beginning!

ETA - one of my personal bugbears too is how horses are often expected to be ridden all year without a break. Traditionally all horses had some kind of break and I think that is really helpful. We usually give ours a break from early March to mid-end of April (4-6 weeks usually). They lose a fair bit of fitness but not all of it so are not usually really difficult to get going again. I have also turned horses away in winter of course. A proper, therapeutic rest is really good for a great many horses (but not all) but lots of people feel really entitled to ride every day or several times a week all year. But we are all different I guess.

 

[I'm Dun]

I'm on week 3 of bringing my TB back into work. Hes a blood horse and lives out so has some residual fitness but we are walking mainly, up to around 10k with the odd short trot now. He wont be cantering till week 6. I dont know many people who bother doing long slow work anymore. I understand why, it bores me to death sometimes, but needs must!

 

[palo1]

I'm on week 3 of bringing my TB back into work. Hes a blood horse and lives out so has some residual fitness but we are walking mainly, up to around 10k with the odd short trot now. He wont be cantering till week 6. I dont know many people who bother doing long slow work anymore. I understand why, it bores me to death sometimes, but needs must!

Yes, the walking work is a killer mentally but it really is helpful. I try to avoid going right back to the beginning of the walk work where possible. After 4 weeks rest most of our horses can hack out in walk with 5 minutes of trot straight away but if there was any query about fitness or injury then it would be back down the ladder to week 1 lol. Our Arab part breds tend to keep fitness well however where my Welsh D probably benefits more from shorter breaks more often.