Fittening for eventing - Question

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Rock's first BE Intro event is on 7th March (if im not balloted of course).
Now i've left him at my livery yard in notts while I came home for Xmas - and while i've been here hes been hacked out 3times a week walk trot and a little canter by the yard owner for about 1-2hours or more on occasions. Before I left he was being ridden by me 7days a week for minimum of an hour and was moderately fit.

So I go back on 6th January and obviously want to start getting him fit, firstly to restart my lessons with Polly and secondly to event him in March.

So my questions are: Firstly when do you think he will be fit enough to have an hours lesson again?

And secondly: What sort of fittening regime would you put him through?

Will REALLY appreciate some input and guidance as this is the area I need to learn more about
 
Duke did PN last year and is still very fit. We didn't do anything as hard as you describe and he was fine. Jack rides 6 days a week, hacks for about an hour 3 times, has an hour lesson and schools for about 30-40 mins the other days.
 
Horses don't really start to lose much fitness until about 2 weeks, especially if kept ticking over.

I would say he could do a lesson straight away and with a little fast work would be ready to event at intro pretty soon. Intro is not really that demanding.
 
Fantastic for all the info guys its really appreciated
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They really don't need to be that fit for intro and PN.. if he's fit enough for an hr's lesson (depending on how he finishes the lesson, sweaty? blowing?) but if he's fit enough for an hrs lesson, he should be fit enough for an intro!!!!!

As for the riding him for more than an hr a day, as you said 1 - 2 hrs, sometimes more.. it depends on how you're riding him and what you're doing with im in that time?? the racehorses at work in full fitness don't even work for that long each day?? but then if you're only walking about on a lose rein, then you could do that all day...
As for dressage/schooling work, i don't tend to do much more than 20/30min at a time...
 
I do about 2 schooling sessions (25-20mins work with 10min stretching at walk either end of that) then 3 hacks of about 2hours than 1 lunge in a pessoa (or sometimes ground work depending on how hes performing) and an hours lessons once a week of intense work (at the mo he finishes VERY tired).
but he has every 8 or 9th day off
 
Definately does not need that must work to get fit for a little Intro..it would be putting unecessary wear on tear on him. about half that amount of work would be fine ! No wonder he is getting so tired.
Can he not have one day off a week?
 
Agree he doesnt need to be that fit! Will you be at Oasby? Mine will get hacked 3/4times a week, for about an hour, mainly walk and trot work with a small amount of cantering, and then a session in the school and either a comp or lunge session with a day off a week. He will also have a good gallop out XC schooling about 2weeks before the evnt, and some emphasis on canter work the week befor the week before his first event.
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Hacking is my main form of fitness work, but with younger horses, small amounts and often are better than long sessions that tire them out.
 
Yep agree with everyone else, I think he is well fit enough for an Intro, but fitness is a very individual thing, my big TB really doesnt need any fast work, where as my ID mare is trained almost like a racehorse to do an intro. I have also found that some horses are better to go out a little less fit (if that makes sense) as then they dont spend as much time fighting you.
I remember at Chatsworth a few years ago, we were parked next to Heidi Anikizides?? and she announced to my mum that they didnt need to be fit for Novice!!!!!!!! I thought my mum was going to deck her!!!!
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They really don't need to be that fit for intro and PN.. if he's fit enough for an hr's lesson (depending on how he finishes the lesson, sweaty? blowing?) but if he's fit enough for an hrs lesson, he should be fit enough for an intro

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Ditto. The course really isn't very long at all. I wouldn't have any strict 'regime,' just tried to ensure he was kept ticking. You don't really need any fast work, since the speeds aren't that quick, (but obviously better to err on the side of caution and have a horse too fit rather than the other way round). Good luck
 
Interesting and I take all your comments on board but surely its v individual to the horse? He's doing all that at the mo and Polly is still saying to me he is not fit enough - and obviously i'm going to take what she thinks seriously. It doesn't take a lot to get him blowing though I do think that before I came home for xmas he was fit enough for intro.
He will be having one day off a week when i get back, as I will not be able to be up at all on a thursday due to uni all day and all evening on a thursday.

BUT the question wasn't based on what I was doing with him - the question was based on what hes been doing over the last 3weeks which is 3 hacks per week for 1 -2 hours
 
By the sounds of things he is finding the work you are doing with polly hard work which is why he is getting tired quickly. Goddy was the same with his lessons, but still managing ODE's without a prob. If you are doing a regular amount of long slow hacks with occasional but regular quick work, and regular schooling or jumping you shouldnt have a prob. Rocks may find he needs to be a bit fitter because of his breathing?
 
Ah that's interesting - the work we are doing with Polly is very intense. Excellent, and you think the 3weeks of less frequent work won't have had too much of an effect on his fitness levels then?
Thankfully, Rocks breathing problems have completely recovered (it turned out to be an allergic reaction to the flu vaccine) xx
 
I was just about to say doesn't he have breathing probs .... for that reason I'd probably do a bit of basic interval training with him just so you can assess he is breathing ok and hopefully build his lung capacity a bit.
 
As a regular fence judge, I regularly see Intro and PN horses AND riders that are not fit enough to get around the XC. When 1 or both are puffing by fence 7, you really should not be there...
 
You'll be fit in plenty of time!!
Many eventers dont come in until after xmas and they make it to March events fine.
You dont want him too fit for intros but as he isnt a tb I would do a bit of faster work to get his breathing/heart rate up in the last couple of weeks before the event.
 
Interesting, I hadn't thought about that.
Thanks for all your input
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KatB - I take it you'll be at Oasby too? I can't wait! I'm not so much worried about him being fit for that because thats ages away but i'm more trying to see when he'll be ready to start having lessons again after this period of less work.
 
H e's not allowed to have normal hard feed is he? I wonder if he is getting tiered because he is not getting enough energy from his feed. Is there anyway in which he can up his energy intake? more oil?
 
I imagine he will be fine to start lessons very soon. Yep I too will be at Oasbt providing everything goes to plan. We start lightly jumping next weekend, after 4weeks of hacking, and I will start with dressaging and jumping out again very soon
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You planning any comps Dressaging/Sjing at all?
 
Yep i'm hoping to find a few dressages and unaff sj's end of jan and feb - just so i can get him out and about a bit - hes not been out for a good 8 months so I wana try and calm him down a bit before Oasby! lol
 
Aha i'll have a look at them. I'm hoping Brack will have some on and Trent Valley is hacking distance from me - never been there but they have a lot on, have you had any experience of them?
If you're going to be about you'll have to pm me, i'll introduce myself and my boy!
 
Brack are doing things later on I think, Feb/march time. Trent Valley is ok, surface not great but bearable, specially if hackable!! Think am sticking to vale View and Arena Uk, although will pop up to Brack to do the dressage
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Will let you know!
 
I do ODE's and my horse has one day off, two schooling sessions up to one hour (quite hard with trainer) and the rest are hacks but I only do up to one hour and I don't canter out as it's nearly all road work and in fact I hardly trot out. I then go to xc schooling maybe even as much as once a week for an hour leading up to an event. For nearly 2 months I've stored every session I've done in my training/fittening journals on manage my horse website and have also logged his weight weekly and then I can look at the graph to see if his weight it right. My trainer is able to look at the journals i print out each week to assess what i've been doing in the week. I'm feeling so organised this year and looking forward to my first event! Having said all of this my horse was injured for 3 solid months so building him back up has been even more important.
 
it's excellent for exactly this, so much to it. If you store all your stuff you can print it out. so next year I'll be able to look back and see exactly what i did. also i'm going to log how he goes at each event,then look at what i did running up to it and this way my trainer will have such a good idea of what was good or where I went wrong. can even see where his feed makes a difference. lots to do with it. I'm logging my lessons as well and I can see if he puffs at certain times and work out why. pretty bloody good for my ode's thats for sure.
 
I would agree, lots of Intro/PN horses aren't fit enough and finish the course puffing and sweating buckets, we try to finish warm and hardly sweating if possible.
Then again some horses hardly sweat others get foamy with excitement.
I would aim for riding at least five times a week, two sessions of that some hacking followed by schooling, two sessions of jumping and at least one of canter work.
CCj canters round our fields several times a week doing interval training, it's cantering round the whole XC course if they aren't used to cantering that seems to knacker horses from what I've watched.
I am afraid I disagree that anything that can cope with an hour's lesson is fit enough to do Intro, the instructor may hardly stretch the horse depending on what they ask!
I'd read anything about fitness training if I were you and decide what regime suits your horse best, a chunkier sort won't have the stamina of the TB regardless of how fit it is, so it's really a matter of deciding what suits you ..
 
Thanks HH thats really helpful! Yes Rocks, being a bit chunkier, doesn't have easy stamina! He can walk and trot for hours and hours but he just simply cannot keep his canter for very long at all, so this is what i'll have to work on (but then finding somewhere to do canter work is really difficult, is there anywhere you can suggest?) We do have a really huge field, but he naps and bolts for home if i do too much in it :-S
 
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