Is this too many events for a horse?

russian_charm

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Hi,
So I have a bit of a dilemma here, there's been a bit of gap on my and my horse's eventing calender, we did our last ODE about a month ago and there aren't any near by for about another 6 weeks, and then suddenly there 3 ODE's and a cross country clinic in the space of a month that I would really like to go to.
And so I was wondering, is 4 weekends of eventing in a row way too much for a horse? The ODE's are all at about 95cms (not sure what thats called in Britain, but here in Australia its Preliminary), so I'm not talking about 3* here, and the furthest distance we would be travelling would be 4 hours. On either side of these ODE's horse will be having a couple of weeks at home, turned out and in moderate work before competing again.

In the space of about 3 months we normally plan to get to about 3 ODE's, 2-3 training days or local jumping/dressage competitions and a clinic, but being horses it never quite works out like that, and so, since he's had a big gap with lots of time at home, if we were to do these 4 events it technically would fit that 3 month plan, except the events would be all next to each other!

He is only 10 years old and an absolute gun of a jumper, and in the past has coped really well with several competitions in quick succession, but on the other hand has a small joint problem in his hock which he is just beginning treated for (but he's is fine to jump), and I'm not sure how this will effect him if he's asked to do a lot of things in a row.

So yeah, my question in a nutshell, how may events would you do in a row with your horse, and is 3 ode's and a clinic all together too many? Should I only go to a couple of them? (I'm starting to think going 1 month without riding a cross country course is entirely too long and am in hard core ODE withdrawals at the moment, I think I need another horse just so I can go round XC more!)
thankyou!!!
 

Paris1

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I would hazard not too much at that level. You know how fit your horse is, how stressed competing he gets etc. If you think he might not be up to it, go three out of four?
 

russian_charm

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I think he could easily cope mentally, he's normally quite happy and relaxed out, I'm just not so sure how he would go physically, and as a general rule, would that many events be 'frowned upon'?
I think I probably will end up doing 3 of the 4...
 

sazzle44

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I'd go for maybe three of the four, or two events and the clinic. I like my horses to run XC fairly fresh as this is how they perform best. Because of this, I would rather have two succesful days out with plenty of time to recover and then prepare again in between, than squeeze too many in, tire the horses and maybe not be so competive. This is just a personal preference though and you know how your horse competes best. Also, I always take into account the time and distance to travel, it makes a massive difference. Good luck though, sounds like you'll have an exciting month!!
 

russian_charm

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the good thing is one of the events (the last one in the month) is only 10 minutes from my house (3* venue thats open for training year round 10 minutes from my house!!!:D) and 30 minutes from where the horse lives so just goes there for a few hours then comes home
 

Maddie2412

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its up to you but IMO i would say drop one of the events: that way there is a better distribution and with a horse that is 10 and has a hock problem (even if they are fine to jump) i think its a relatively small sacrifice and probably not worth pushing it. however if he is reasonably fit and you think he will cope do go for it. x
 
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