how often to do you ride your 4/5 year olds?

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daniloveshorses

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I have a 4 and a half year old mare and i was just wondering how many times people ride their youngsters a week. I would say i ride her 5 days a week, which will be a mix up between schooling and hacking. Do you think this is suitable? what do you do with yours?
 
I keep mine at a small livery and stud yard and the 4/5 year olds are exercised 5 times a week including lungeing, hacking and schooling and competing. I would just make sure yours is happy and fit enough for the work and you should be fine. Nothing wrong in doing short sessions and slowly building the muscles and concentration span.
 
Now I feel like a lazy owner. My rising 5 year old has had only a handful of hacks in the last 6 months! Poor girl lol. I only have hacking available in the winter as the fields are too muddy to ride in and its difficult to get any hacking in when its dark so early and im out at dog shows at the weekends, so she was backed last year and mostly turned away through the winter, just an occassional hack to keep her ticking over. She is going to stud in a few months though so no point getting her super fit as she wont be getting ridden :D
 
Before my ankle injury I was working my 4 yr old 4/5 times a week with a mixture of schooling and hacking, not overly keen on lungeing too much with a youngster! Unfortunately I bust my ankle so she has now had 14 weeks off! Back to health now so will hopefully be returning to that once she's fit!
 
My 5 year old has spent 15 months hacking 3 to 4 times a week. He is now bombroof as hell. Just starting schooling as well.

So he is doing 3 hacks and 2x 30 mins schooling sessions a week.

Aiming for a Walk-Trot dressage test in May.
 
mine will be working about 5 times a week when I reback him which will start with mostly hacking and odd schooling and then to mostly schooling with hack 1-2x a week as summer progresses :)
 
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