Two week holiday: how much fitness lost?

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Primitive Pony

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I have two weeks away in the middle of the summer and am wondering how much fitness my horse is likely to lose in that time? - I'd like to just give him the time off, turned out 24-7 as he lives out all year anyway, and ideally I'd rather not have to pay anyone else to ride, but may need a re-think!?

I have one ODE at 90cm booked in July for a week before going, and am then considering booking another for August, 10 days after I get back, but wondering if that sounds ok?

Horse has evented at novice in the past and will have no problems with speed/time, plus the second event is a flat one. I know some people say that eventing at this level doesn't take much extra fitness work anyway, and he will be more than fit for the first one, but is he likely to lose much fitness in a fortnight?

Any thoughts greatly appreciated!
 
they shouldn't lose anything really in two weeks - in fact I usually find my horse feels bloody amazing when I get back on after a week or two break. You will be fine.
 
Studies in racehorses have shown that a horse lost very little fitness in 2 weeks when stabled and put on the horse walker for half an hour a day or turned out for an hour a day. Comparing that with a horse of equal fitness that was turned out 24/7 for 2 weeks the horse lost at least 1/3 of it's fitness. The theory being that the stabled horse was always expecting work so never let himself down where as the one turned out went into Holiday mode, relaxed and let the muscles down.
 
EKW said:
Studies in racehorses have shown that a horse lost very little fitness in 2 weeks when stabled and put on the horse walker for half an hour a day or turned out for an hour a day. Comparing that with a horse of equal fitness that was turned out 24/7 for 2 weeks the horse lost at least 1/3 of it's fitness. The theory being that the stabled horse was always expecting work so never let himself down where as the one turned out went into Holiday mode, relaxed and let the muscles down.
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Hi EKW - do you have a link to that study somewhere?
I remember reading one where event horses didn't lose fitness after 5 weeks, - can't remember the details but i think they were turned out in large paddocks with uneven terrain so maybe the type of turnout affects it too. A horse i bought with very bad feet that regularly had a week or two off with stone bruises never showed a worsened recovery rate after fitness work or eventing. He was out 24/7 but was out all year round and on paddocks with small hills so maybe that made a difference.
 
Interesting about the horse turned out theory!

I would imagine it's different if the horse lives out normally, as that is "normal" to them which would be the same as a horse who is stabled normally where being stabled is "normal" to them.

Suppose in racehorses they traditionally got their holiday turned out in a field whereas when in work they were stabled all the time (maybe an hour of turnout etc.) so that association with racehorses mightn't transfer to eventers/normal riding horses who tend to get more time turned out everyday and don't necessarily get a couple of months off a year?
 
I was temp head lad when the trainer went on holiday for ten days, these horses were worked [as in ridden] 7 days a week but when trainer was not there staff refused to ride, on the basis that horses went out and won as soon as given the chance, it worked for them, even if I was being steamrollered, it was a lot less responsibility as less could go wrong.
Also it was fun playing cricket in the afternoon :)
The horse will benefit from a break at that stage imho.

We did have a mare sent to us [at a stud] for covering she was straight from training and she was sent back as she would not let herself down, but she was an exception.
 
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Thank you, this is really useful food for thought! My horse is so laid back that I can't imagine he'd ever need to let himself down like a racehorse might, thought he is mostly TB! - but confident now that he can have two weeks off without me panicking!! :-)
 
When mares in training are sent to stud, once covered and scanned they are often sent back to train on, and they often improve, this is thought to be due to hormonal changes, it might also have freshened them up.
 
During the height of the competition season, I don't ride my pony much at all between rides. There's a rule of thumb of 1 day off per 10k of competitive ride. Three weeks ago, he did a 50k, sailed through the vet gate quickly on a 44/42 heart rate (that's the Cardiac Recovery Index), and then was unfortunately lamed out at the end. He was off pottering about the paddock until last weekend, when (with the physio's go-ahead), I took him to a camp ride, where he negotiated 60k of slow hilly terrain over two days. He finished day 1 with a 46 and day 2 with a 43, both within just a few minutes (time to untack). Clearly, the two weeks' rest had very little impact on his fitness! :) Each spring since his first season, I've been astonished at how little fitness he appears to lose even with a long lay-off (it was nearly 5 months this year), and how quickly the fitness goes back on, even with quite light work, in terms of hours in the saddle.
 
In the USA the endurance riders tend to give their horses long breaks between rides and there was a study reported in
H & H years ago in Australia that racehorses didn't loose fitness for 6 weeks, but I don't know if that was for stabled horses or ones turned out.

As for the turned out ones - it depends on how active they are too and what sort of terrain they are on. The horse I used to event was a TB runt, for a better word! He used to burst out of his stable every morning and gallop round the field 3 or 4 times before having a couple of rolls before settling down to eat. He was easy to get and keep fit. Another TBx used to put in maximum effort to whatever she was doing, even a short walk round the block was done as fast as she could walk and she would come home steaming. She was also easy to get and keep fit. My present horse is the laid back and lazy and he is VERY hard to get fit.

In the days that we had proper winters, hunting was often stopped for 2-3 weeks and the hunters couldn't do much in the meantime, but everyone carried on hunting just the same after the break.
 
I had a similar dilemma a couple of years ago, and I was following an endurance horse fitness programme. What I did was the day before I went away I went on a 13 mile trotting and cantering route as if he was competing, complete workout for him. Although only going away for 5 days, when I got back on board he felt like he had jumped two stages of fittening, seriously upped his game :)
 
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