Those that are training for endurance or Man v Horse- how’s it going?

[Julia0803]

I was just wondering how people were getting on with their fitness work/training for upcoming events?

We’re struggling a bit with the speed as a lot of our (limited) off road hacking is so boggy due to all this torrential rain we’ve been having . So our time is dragged down by lots of roadwork and now iffy ground requiring walking. We are trotting/cantering everywhere possible. We’re currently averaging 4-4.5mph over a ride (he only has a little walk at 3.3mph when he’s really marching).

On the plus side we have a LOT of big hills around here, so I’m guessing that helps as the ride we’re doing is apparently very flat.

I was just being a bit nosey as I’m not experienced at all, this is our first graded ride after doing a PR last year and I’m a bit of a worrier! Some of the things I’ve read have said that up to 30km a horse in reasonable normal work should cope fine. Eg- https://www.bellafricker.co.uk/sing...in-endurance-how-fit-does-my-horse-need-to-be

My husband does (human!) long distance running, marathons and ultra marathons, and doesn’t train the same distance he’ll run at an event, so he’s trying to be reassuring. I just don’t want the event to be too much of a stretch compared to what he’s used to.

We’re hoping to do 24km (15 miles) on the 23rd.

We’re currently hacking about 9/10 miles once a week, sometimes twice in 10 days, and then 2-3 shorter hacks of 4-6miles per week. Plus usually an easy day of walk poles. Hopefully we’ll do at least one 11 and one 13 mile hack over the next two and a bit weeks, and then an easier few days in the run up to 23rd.

When we were hacking shorter distances we were doing 5/6 days a week but now we’re going a little further I have tried to put a few more days off in as I remember last year Maggie Pattinson explaining they were really important to build on the gains you were making, rather than breaking them down through lack of time to repair.

He felt brilliant when we went out yesterday, marched all the way round, inc up and down the steep long hills (apparently 39% of the ride was uphill looking at my stats), and finished on a 41 bpm HR by the time we pulled up at home (1.25miles of walking roadwork from bridleway to home).

We’ve got a training session at the gallops with Maggie to see how we’re getting on the week after next so I’m looking forward to that.

Just wondering what others are doing and how they are coping with such soggy boggy ground?

 

[Kunoichi73]

Thank you for sharing this. It's really interesting to see how you train for endurance riding.

 

[Ample Prosecco]

Lottie does a long steady ride once a week. Then shorter rides in the week. One with extended trot and canter sections and 1 recovery.

The speeds, sustained efforts and distances are all slowly increasing. Her longest ride so far has been 16 miles which took 4 hours.

She’s booked into 2 x 20 mile fun rides between now and MvH.

Im sure that is more than she needs really. But she loves it and is still full of beans at the end of long rides.

 

[FitzyFitz]

I'm taking my novice mare to a 40km on the 22nd. Not too worried about her fitness as we moved last year and although our hacking is now slower going with more road and currently very muddy slippery tracks, it's also really hilly so it's been dead easy to do nice active walk work and trot intervals.

She's currently turned out 24/7 and ridden probably 3 times a week (varies) for a distance of 8-20km generally mostly in walk due to the ground conditions.

I always find they don't need to do as much work to get ready for an endurance ride as many people think, and the rest days are also important. Mine has been in ridden work since 2020 now, obviously didn't do much competing but plenty of hacking about and building up longer term fitness.

My (now retired) advanced pony would often do a 30 or 40km competitive ride as part of his early season fitness as he swapped from ticking over for winter to full work. After a few seasons they get much easier to get back to full fitness!

Hoping to get the little novice up to open level this year (so doing gated rides of 64km) but I don't know all my local rides anymore so we'll see how that goes!

 

[Julia0803]

We did 11.8 miles this morning and he went really well. It should have been just under 11 but it we took a new loop we haven’t ever done before and got a bit lost and had to double back after missing a turn .

As usual a fair amount of hills. It took exactly 3 hours, so it wasn’t fast but equally, there was a lot of roadwork/boggy ground that required walking so I wasn’t too worried.

His HR stayed well below 120bpm apart from one canter stretch when we suddenly went into warp speed unexpectedly. I turned round and a loose dog had appeared out of the undergrowth and chased us for a few seconds.

Feeling a bit more positive after today! A well earned rest day tomorrow. We’ll do a shorter one of 5 miles Thursday and then another day off on Friday.

 

[musk]

I'm finding this thread really interesting as I know nothing of endurance or how much training is needed