How many times do you ride a week? Amateur rider, one horse...

My 6yr old does 'something' every day, so either schooling, hacking, lunging or lessons be it jumping or flat. She will do 10-14 days of work, then one day off.
 
There was a study that popped onto my Facebook page, but it was in the USA. There were 3 groups of horses, each thoroughly examined and tested for fitness. One was turned out in 100 acre pasture (!), one stabled at night, turned out in 1 acre during the day and exercised not excessively, but sort of competition fit and one group that was stabled, not ridden and might have had a short bit of turnout in 1 acre paddock.

At the end of the trial period the horses turned out at pasture were as fit as those ridden regularly and the ones that lost fitness were the stabled ones. The horses out at pastured covered longer distances than those being ridden regularly.
Interesting, but not that relevant to the UK. I have heard that in the USA endurance horses are not ridden between racerides, but then if they can roam over 100 acres that does keep them fit.
 
I met some ladies who run ranch holidays and they were saying that their quarter horses come off the pasture in spring and straight into full work - they run all winter on 100s of acres.

However I'd say that cardio / hacking fitness is very different to dressage fitness. When Pocholo was very fit for hacking (full day rides 3-4 times a week) I sent him for bootcamp, but the trainer warned me that it would take 3 months to get him to the point of being able to intensive schooling, i.e. introducing collection etc. Dressage is more like weight-lifting and needs specific muscles to be able to take a lot of load.
 
Everyday. I wouldnt if I didn't have to but if my horse has a day or two off he refers back to holiday mode and then I have fun the first time I ride him just fighting him as he'll refuse to do anything properly, even a circle.

Because of his back, most days is just easy work in the school or walking/trotting up and down hills. Some days I ask more from him, more trotting, some canter, might do pole work or trotting over tiny jumps etc. But it's more of the slow work and gradually building up the harder stuff.

He is just one of those that needs to be kept active unfortunately. I want an easier horse that I can ignore for a week and it will be the same as when I left it. He used to be like that but as he gets older he is happier working. You'd think it would be the other way around.
 
Orangehorse said:
There was a study that popped onto my Facebook page, but it was in the USA. There were 3 groups of horses, each thoroughly examined and tested for fitness. One was turned out in 100 acre pasture (!), one stabled at night, turned out in 1 acre during the day and exercised not excessively, but sort of competition fit and one group that was stabled, not ridden and might have had a short bit of turnout in 1 acre paddock.

At the end of the trial period the horses turned out at pasture were as fit as those ridden regularly and the ones that lost fitness were the stabled ones. The horses out at pastured covered longer distances than those being ridden regularly.
Interesting, but not that relevant to the UK. I have heard that in the USA endurance horses are not ridden between racerides, but then if they can roam over 100 acres that does keep them fit.
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That would be this one, I imagine:

http://www.thehorse.com/articles/32630/study-horses-able-to-stay-fit-when-kept-at-pasture

Shared by TarrSteps probably.

Would love to have 100 acres, but that's not realistic over here. I do have reasonable turnout (considerable more than an acre!) on a big hill and I try to turnout as much as I possibly can. Compromises abound!
 
j1ffy said:
I met some ladies who run ranch holidays and they were saying that their quarter horses come off the pasture in spring and straight into full work - they run all winter on 100s of acres.

.
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That made me wince. Are they considering the fitness of the stomach and back muscles to hold up a rider?



To answer the original question, when I was working full time I rode four times a week and was happy with that balance between horse, work and home.
 
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ycbm said:
That made me wince. Are they considering the fitness of the stomach and back muscles to hold up a rider?



To answer the original question, when I was working full time I rode four times a week and was happy with that balance between horse, work and home.
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The weight of a rider and those huge Western saddles..! Still, they've been doing it for years and they run a full ranch alongside the holiday ranch so I guess it works for them...
 
My mare normally works six days a week, but I don't worry if it is 5 or 7. Depending upon my commitments.

In winter I will hack or hunt on the two weekend days and her day off will be a week day leaving 4 week days for schooling/jumping/lunging unless my husband hacks out on a weekday.

I don't lunge more than once a week, and generally less than that but it is good for nights when I am short of time or energy.

In summer it is less structured and involves more hacking as we have light evenings. Unusually I probably ride a bit less in summer as my husband is more keen to ride when the weather is good and we have long days 🙄

I need to jump more to keep my eye in and fitness/confidence up and see any improvement but find it difficult to fit in due to the extra time for setting fences and often being alone.
 
I probably rode 4-5 times a week before my horse broke his pedal bone and now has to have 3+months off to recover.

I got my boy in March 2015 and had barely ever ridden before (other than hacking out). In 2016 I decided to put him on full livery as I lived in Gloucester and worked in London. During this time I probably rode him 4 days a week and they did 2 with him - give or take depending on how busy my weeks were. Out of those 4 I had at least 1 lesson every week, sometimes 2 (flatwork & jump).

I moved him off of full livery earlier this year and started having lessons with a wider variety of trainers and changing up his routine a bit. I started schooling him once a week, jumping a couple of times a week and then either a hack or lunge, when I had time he'd go to the gallops/XC schooling or just out to jump around a course as well as competing maybe once a month.

In just over a year I went from pretty novice to happily competing at BE90 (and considering stepping up) and jumping around a SJ course of 1.10+ and winging it at dressage lol BUT I was lucky to have some awesome trainers, a very willing horse and not a lot else to do other than work and ride my pony!
 
I have one horse which I ride 2/3 times a week with lessons once a week. I also exercise other ponies too but that on a more random basis as in the owners might randomly ask me if I will (we all know and trust each other as it's a small livery)
I used to ride once a week on a shared horse but then I bought him and honestly my riding improved so much - in 1 week with him I went from jumping xpoles to jumping 1m!
 
I try to ride/work my 14yr old mare 5 or 6 times a week although thanks to my job it can be a bit on the spot as most of the week im on call as opposed to having set hours. In an average week i would go in the school 3 times for 40mins minimum (1 day pole work, 1 day schooling and then either schooling again or jumping), hack 2 times and then on the 6th she either gets it off if she's worked hard, we go out competing, go x-country etc... basically something more interesting for either of us than the standard daily routine or we just have a lazy day of nothing. It seems to work for us. A good blast across the fields a couple times a week keeps her sweet enough in the school to progress with her dressage so its win win.
 
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