Interesting conversation happening here in the USA

BunnyDog

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ester

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I just read that thread and guessed that's what you had posted.

I had a question you might help with related to horses not going to multiple championships and/or horses not doing multiple kentuckys.
What is the situ with selection events? In order to get a horse selected to go to a championship will it have had to do an awful lot more travelling in order to get selected than ours do?

I do think they have over-estimated the soundness of many long term hunt horses too.
 

tristar

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our farrier travels to florida and canada every few weeks to shoe horses competing up to international, he gets a lot of money, must be a clue there?
 

ester

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Which reminds me of another comment, we still manage to have rubbish farriers here, but perhaps not so much as with no regulation?
 

Lammy

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I’m interested on what a few have posted about conditioning horses saying we start early on in the winter. Do riders in the US not spend as much time bringing their horses back into fitness or is there no let down time at all?
That sounds like a recipe for breakage at all levels if there’s no full fittening done??
 

Lyle

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Super interesting. I wonder if it has a lot to do with countries like Australia and England having a culture of individual ownership, with vast quantities of owners taking control of the care of the horses. (such as diet, working them etc) with information being learned from professionals such as coaches, body workers etc. From my understanding in the US, there seems to be a lot of owners who keep horses at large barns, with the horse management being undertaken by the barn ownership, with owners turning up to ride under the instruction of the barn coach (generalised, I'm certainly not saying this is the case in all situations).
I know here in Aus most people keep horses at home. If you want to do well, you seek out coaches. The pony club system has horsemanship qualifications you need to achieve in order to compete at higher standard competitions. The rider is the groom and primary carer of their horses, so if you want your horse to do well, you look after it! Our comps also run for designated seasons, august through to December and then late February to June, allowing horses to have time off between seasons. It's not uncommon to see eventers here competing for years at the top end, competing at the major CCI events across the Country. Riders like Sonja Johnson who has had top end 4* horses who are also working horses on the sheep station! and who cross the Nulabore and spend countless hours travelling to compete at the East coast competitions, yet still compete at top level at 20.
 

Mouse&Bay

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I’m interested on what a few have posted about conditioning horses saying we start early on in the winter. Do riders in the US not spend as much time bringing their horses back into fitness or is there no let down time at all?
That sounds like a recipe for breakage at all levels if there’s no full fittening done??

I’m an amateur in Canada. I primarily compete in eventing but most of my barn mates do hunter or jumpers. The provincial championships are in September but most people tend to keep riding and schooling as per normal. Very few people give their horses more than a week or so off (usually when they go on vacation). Some trainer use that opportunity to earn some money with training rides. I am an anomaly as I like giving mine a week or two off here and there.

Our barn has an active fall and winter show season as well. Despite the harsh winters, the closest to “off” would be to sit out a week or two of lessons. Most people will jump once a week in their lesson unless their horses is ill. Our winter season just finished with a classic evening, the official provincial circuit will start the first weekend of May.

The horses generally work year round at about the same pace, 4 to 6 rides per week. Depending on the owner there may be one or two jump schools per week, either in lessons or pro rides by the trainer. I would say most people ride for 45 min or so, depending on weather and fitness.
 

spookypony

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Interesting question! As a Canadian having moved to the UK, I can say that the cultures are very different. I am still in amazement that here, I can afford to hire a little yard, and of course I take the prime responsibility for all aspects of management, from negotiating with the yard owners about field management, to researching and calculating nutrition, putting heads together with the hoof trimmer, deciding on a training regime in conversation with my instructor, and, OMG, expecting that I can hitch up a trailer, go to a competition by myself, tie up my horse with a haynet (and expect her still to be there when I get back from the admin), and do a test or whatever without babysitting from a trainer (although sometimes, a babysitter is appreciated!). So the basic culture of competing amateurs, I would say is very different.

I try to ride mine year round, but she gets frequent breaks in the summer after longer endurance rides, and from October to Christmas, I'm lucky if I can manage 1 or 2 slow hacks in a week. This year, she had 6 weeks completely off. What does change is the type of work that is most prevalent, and I try to make sure we have lots of variety.
 

Goldenstar

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It’s a very pertinent article .
Horses ought to be an exercise in life long learning and for many now that’s just a alien concept .
I am learning as much and faster now at approaching sixty as I did when I was twenty I was lucky that’s the mindset I grew up in I think that’s lost now for many people .
The writer of the article is spot on you have to spend time with horses there’s no substitute for that at any age .
You need to know about everything your self to be able to everything bar surgery and the vet stuff and nailing on shoes yourself .
You need to be learning learning learning all the time .
Here’s my top three that are wasting horses .

Shoeing and wearing shoes all year round some of the farriers are just plain bad and in the UK our extremely regulated shoeing industry exists to protect the farriers not the horses from bad farriers .
No shoeing breaks for me this does not work every time for what ever reason a horse misses a shoeing break I get trouble .
Twelve weeks every year minimum mine are out of shoes they can still do something work wise but without shoes .

Management too little work and turnout and poor weight management .

Training we need to have more better trainers training riders for tomorrow not for the test or jumping round at the weekend at the weekend .
We need to be better at training and conditioning the horses bodies that’s their cores and top line Here’s where we hit the soundness issues that’s what I think is causing so much wasteage of beautiful horses .
This work Is unglamorous and slow but boy does it pay you back we need to always have that in our heads and be returning to it all the time always checking is the horse working right in it’s core it’s back and neck can it stretch really stretch and maintain balance .
I see good horses all the time with weak cores and incorrect muscles in the back and neck .
 

Lammy

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I’m an amateur in Canada. I primarily compete in eventing but most of my barn mates do hunter or jumpers. The provincial championships are in September but most people tend to keep riding and schooling as per normal. Very few people give their horses more than a week or so off (usually when they go on vacation). Some trainer use that opportunity to earn some money with training rides. I am an anomaly as I like giving mine a week or two off here and there.

Our barn has an active fall and winter show season as well. Despite the harsh winters, the closest to “off” would be to sit out a week or two of lessons. Most people will jump once a week in their lesson unless their horses is ill. Our winter season just finished with a classic evening, the official provincial circuit will start the first weekend of May.

The horses generally work year round at about the same pace, 4 to 6 rides per week. Depending on the owner there may be one or two jump schools per week, either in lessons or pro rides by the trainer. I would say most people ride for 45 min or so, depending on weather and fitness.

I would say what you’re describing does sound like most lower level horses here, they will be competing quite lightly intensity wise and eventers may then hunt in the off season from October-February maybe giving their horses a couple of weeks to a months break in between.

I’m interested that (according to the forum) the pros don’t rest their horses? Here most top horses will finish Burghley or Pau and then not come back into work until November/December. Starting with walk work and building up to their first event early March. Most are roughed off and look totally different to the superstars we’re used to seeing flying around in the summer but it’s so good for them to get to be horses rather than just athletes.
Here’s Harry Meade’s Away Cruising enjoying his holidays in October.

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