what hacking have you got and how important is it for your competition horses?

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ironhorse

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Following on from the how often do you hack thread, interested to know what access people have got to hacking and how important it is to them.

We've got a 45min circuit on quiet lanes and 1 bridleway, plus another bridleway on which you have to turn round and come back unless you want a 2hr plus ride - this one is accessed via 2 blind bends on a reasonably busy road!

We can also ride in the fields for some of the year, although this will be restricted this year due to different cropping.

As our horses are all comp horses and we have an indoor school, roundpen and reasonable turnout, it's not a huge deal, although I'd really like to get my youngster going on some more 'fun' hacks next year. Would minimal hacking put you off a comp yard?

Would like to hear experiences and opinions...
 
we have amazing hacking- hours of extremely quiet lanes and also miles of off road riding so I can hack for well over an hour without having to touch a road.

It does make fitness easier to get and maintain (and is less monotonous for me!).

We also have horse walker, 3 x arenas, show jumps on grass and a full xc course (slightly spoilt!)

the lack of hacking would put me off with my current horse as she can be traffic shy so I purposely chose this yard for the hacking and facilities.

However, my trainer has absolutely zero hacking and her horses are competing up to BE Advanced with no fitness worries.
She does go to the gallops a lot though and I think does steady work there are well as cantering to make up for the lack of hacking.
 
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I live on a competition yard with walker, paddocks and an indoor arena and usually hack my horse about once a week, sometimes a couple of times. I do fast work in the field at least once a week too though.

My week usually consists of one jump lesson, one flat lesson and school once, work on pessoa once, hack once, fast work once (he isn't a young horse but new to me and not done much at all, just started eventing him at lower level so still needs quite a lot of education).

I feel he has a varied work routine and seems very happy with it. Obviously depends on your horse and whether it's the type to go stale doing a fair bit of 'school work' I guess.

Fitness wise I find the canter/fast work in an uphill field does the same job, although do have a lot of hills when we do hack too which all helps
 
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I have access to quiet lanes and alot of off road hacking in a good friends fields (her dad is a farmer :))
To me hacking is so important for Fitness... We are out 3/4 times a week for a good hour, try and do a longer 2 hour at weekends. We have a lot of good lanes to trot up to
 
Rubbish hacking but its the compromise for having excellent transport links.

Everything I have is expected to go down the A38 and over the Motorway Bridges. All ours are excellent to hack as live on a farm and see very heavy traffic all the time with A38 and Mway.

I have hills and beach all within 20 mins so I guess if I can be bothered to put the trailer on it is all fine. Hacking is vital for me - they all have very strong legs, are laid back and enjoy their work. We have no arena so even though I loathe it I have to hack in the winter.
 
Very. One gets very 'stale' if she doesn't hack out, I'm blessed with great off road hacking so it's fantastic for canter work and fitness.
My other one is 14 and I mostly hack her out and school her as we go (I'm lucky that quite a few bridle paths are infact just massive fields, and very quiet roads) I now tend to only go in the school with her for riding lessons or going through dressage tests. I feel this suits her better.
 
I'm based on a large yard with good facilities.
We have an on site 15 minute hacking route through the yards woods which is useful warm up/cool down.
Off site we have a mix of country lanes, woodland bridleways and field perimeters.

Although I'm not massively into hacking, I do consider it really very important part of any horses work and wouldn't contemplate going to a yard where there was no access to hacking. I tend to hack a minimum of twice a week and often 3 times and make a concious effort to go out for 1.5-2hrs at least once a fortnight to get in some good canters/jumping.
 
I have about 70 acres of forest tracks literally on the yard however a lot of the tracks were recently upgraded to hard core so it's not as good for fast work as it once was - still provides a few areas for a gallop and if you go round all the tracks I can wander about in there for over an hour - I will often warm up or cool down before schooling by going for a 30 minute hack round there.

We also have a fair bit of quite road hacking and some stone tracks that go round the reservoir although you either have to turn back or hack over the motorway bridge and through a small village to do a loop. You have the option of a 2 mile loop or a much longer 6 mile loop. You do meet traffic but not much.


There are some routes that I haven't even explored yet despite being at the yard for almost 3 years simply because they would need hours to complete and I don't always have the time.

Hacking is pretty important to me - both for fittening and also just to have another option than schooling or lunging - sometimes I don't have the energy or focus to do anything productive so will hack instead.

I've not hacked as much as I'd like this summer - I tend to prefer hacking at the weekend when I have more time but have been competing most weekends or the weather hasn't been nice enough to hack out - will hopefully get some crisp autumnal hacks though I'll be starting to wind down for the winter.
 
I moved from an area with immense hacking, to an area without much, and I really do miss it! Mainly from the fittening point of view. At my old yard my horses were as fit as a flea, just from taking them out round the rides. Now I have to make a conscious effort to get it in, and that requires boxing to gallops which is hard when you work full time.
 
Important enough that i want to move yards because of lack of hacking.
All i have is road work or some road work, cross a busy duel carriage way via traffic lights (with traffic on that road, we get really wierd looks in peoples rear view mirrors!:D)to get to the downs and to be quite honest he is a bit of a twit on the road. I try and box him to some really good hacking but i rely on my oh to drive the lorry so im limited to weekends, cant seem to fit that in and compete on the same weekend.
Im finding with my boy hacking helps, i can work on his fittness and way of going out of the school, he seems to get it a bit better plus i can really get him forwards. I dont tend to be one for long rambling hacks but i like to go out for a good hour and do what i need whether its walk work, trot work or canter work.
Ive always used hacking to help with there schooling so i guess im really missing it not having any hacking, even if its only at the weekends in the winter for me its better than working in the school all the time.
 
I have rubbish hacking, all busy country roads with blind corners. They get hacked once a fortnight on the roads in walk but they are very hilly so they get a good workout then when the ground is fine they do once a week canter work in our fields. They are show jumpers so don't need the same kind of fitness as eventers. We have talked about taking them to gallops for variety. It's not ideal but I try to keep an eye for any signs they are stale but I suppose I'm lucky they all enjoy their work. They do get turnout so they can have a good run and we are getting a walker in too
 
40 hectares of country park with lots of different paths so we can either have a quick half hour hack or a nice long 3 hour one. I love my hacking :D
 
Very important to me. I think it's important for them to get a change of scenery as well as for building/maintaining fitness. In summer I hack more than I school (this may explain our poor dressage marks?! ;) ) although in winter full time work and lack of daylight will reverse this and it's only possible to hack at weekends when not competing, so school through the week.

Hacking has been vital recently with Hopalong coming back from box/field rest after injury and having to spend time doing lots of hacking to regain fitness/muscle, trot work on the (quiet) roads being the main activity to condition her legs and get her fit again.

I am very lucky that I have only one short stretch of busy road to negotiate en route to off road sections where I can do fast work- this busy road is straight and wide so easy for drivers to see/pass us safely, although this does encourage them to slow down less a lot of the time. :( I have access to a fabulous grass strip that is about 1.5km long and goes uphill, then plateaus out, then down the other side and is great for doing lengths of fast work to get eventing fit.

There is a good variety of routes in the area that I can ride in 1-1.5hrs and plenty scope to make them longer if time allows. I couldn't be without good hacking I don't think.
 
Nooooone really. We have a main road next to the yard, and nobody hacks near roads here because it'd be a bit suicidal. Sometimes I wish hacking over here had more of a UK view about it , but no such luck. I think it'd make a huge difference to my competition horse..and will try my best to find some random dirt road that goes past the buck and zebra and stuff :)
 
We have an indoor school and an outdoor school, loads of turnout, nice small yards on a bigger site, automatic water, rotated grazing, fab staff and lovely other people and still I complain about my lack of hacking! The hacking round us is flat open fields - a 10/15min loop, a 20/25 min loop, a 35 min loop or 1hour / 1.5 hours of toll rides accessed from a short walk down a country lane. The only roadwork available involves doubling back on yourself or braving a very busy fast rat run road (my horse is very good in traffic and I wouldn't chance it). I constantly find myself wishing we had hills, places to do canter work and woods to hack in. I usually box my horse to ride with friends so I can get this type of terrain but it can be hard to fit in when I am competing at weekends. I find that my horse needs to keep her mind occupied and our limited hacking doesn't do that - as a result I tend to have to hack alone from my yard as she can bounce around and upset others. Last week someone kindly offered to nanny us on their quiet horse and I had to politely decline - toodling about is a bit of a no no unless I want an explosion. My horse will actually happily nanny babies and is an excellent influence out in the woods or doing roadwork which involves actually seeing people, cars and other sights. She also gives leads past anything scary, bridges, ditches etc etc.

My yard is otherwise perfect so I'm not planning to change but I am very glad now autumn hunting has started and I can take her out for proper fun.
 
It's important to me, gets my horse out and about in the big wide world and it's good to work on different terrain, hills for fitness ect plus it adds variation.

Our hacking is OKish, we don't have any commons or woodlands but we do have farmers fields that we can ride around which is good for canter work. Other than that it is all quiet country lanes and our horses are used to doing a lot of roadwork. We have several different routes for short hacks, medium hacks and long hacks. Luckily the lanes are quiet, the traffic is quite considerate and it's very hilly!! Lots of road hills which gets the horses puffing ;). We do get a lot of farm machinery down the roads but they stop and turn their engines off so it's OK.

I used to keep my late horse on the edge of about 3/4 massive commons with sandy soil. Wow that was amazing!! You could ride all day and not go on roads and the going was always perfect, amazing views too! To top it off the hunt would use it and there would be the hunt jumps left up. Oh how I miss that hacking!!
 
I had always been terrified of hacking then...

Whilst I was on holiday my horse went to my intructors where it was noted he was so backward by the
end of the lesson you were knackered!

Turns out he needs hacked 3/4
times every week to get him to think for himself

I normally ride in te field as that's all I have and that is also his turnout field
It should be his chillout zone but he cant distinguish it between fun an work so he became lazy
Now with hacking lots he is unbelievably forward and really has improved on the flat and jumping he has a very active brain and needs to be kept occupied otherwise he gets bored
He also thrives on a yard as oppose to in a field as It keeps him active

I never knew not hacking was such a problem until someone else could see him
 
We've got v good hacking, lots of quiet lanes, byways, bridleways and fields. Were spoilt for choice really! I think it's v v important for horses to get out and see the world and it's definitely something on my let of 'must haves' when looking a a yard.
 
I love hacking, and so does billy :) we only have road hacking, but can get onto quieter country roads.
we can have stretching hacks where all on loose rein, or schooling ones where we do lateral work etc and long low stuff up hills.
Only the occasional gallop if we find a field good enough and farmer dosent mind :D

plus all our routes are circular so they never have to turn back for home :)
 
we're really lucky and can hack all day without touching a road. We have lots of hills (so horse has a nice muscley bum), straight sandy tracks for gallops and are really spoilt for hacking.
It's really important for me because my mare is intelligent and gets bored with too much schooling so misbehaves if she's stale from schoolwork.
 
hacking is very important to me and thankfully at yard have lots. most of it is on roads but they are quiet country lanes, but if going for a long hack have quite a lot of offroad tracks/moorland etc available to use. We have lovely great big steep hills here which are fabulous for fitness work and i believe her legs are that bit stronger because of the road work we do.

in summer i will hack more than i work in the school but in winter can only hack at weekends due to the light. I find it keeps her fresher as well as gives much more variety to her life. plus i love going out and enjoying the scenery as we really do have some stunning views/surroundings :D

Oh and Fleur once upon a time didn't do hacking. thankfully finally changed her mind and she loves it now :D
 
I replied to another post simelar so I've pretty much repeated myself here but what the hey!!

I believe if you can, hack as much as possible (coming from an Eventing point of veiw) I have always ridden horses that were fairly talented on the flat but have had to have been very conscious that you don't sour them out as they weren't so calm and willing to school day in day out as some more forgiving horses.

I think with a fit event horse, once you have a training schedule and are galloping every fifth day, hacking becomes sort of the staple diet of your horse's excercise with schooling and jumping being the 'supplements' if you will :-)

I find it keeps em' happy and on their toes, also what I find beneficial with some that switch off in the school is that if you find space in a feild or even when you're hacking along tracks to go out intentionally to dressage school them (but out hacking). You can practice your shoulder ins and half pass and it relates more to how they feel out competing when they're in unknown territory. I see so many people drilling movements in the arenas and then wondering why it goes to pot at an event...practice in the same (ish) environments every now and then!

The hacking at my old yard was brill, not too many hills but it went on for miles. I'm moving down to Buckinghamshire soon to be based with a certain very famous young man (wink wink) and the yard is smack bang in the middle of the chilton hills!! Eek!! Hillwork galore!
 
much i hate hacking (boring and dangerous), i prefer it if they do hack, once a week, as think its a nice break.
however, have now had 2 horses in a row that dont/wont hack safely and i dont miss it!

CS never hacks now, gave up after the day he rodeo'd for half a mile then passaged about 5miles home. he's not good in farm traffic, easily sent in to orbit and once he's gone he wont settle.

i dont think he misses it either-he's been 500% more settled in the warm up at shows since he stopped hacking and is perfectly happy pinging round in circles.

he does do pole work and some light seat canter work in the field for variety :)
 
This is my hacking:
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The yard is on 46,000 acres of privately owned forest/moor. Doesn't really get much better than this although getting to competitions takes a little bit longer as we're in the middle of nowhere.

My horse is fairly well established so work in the school is kept to a minimum and I hack most days; we also have a xc course within easy hacking distance :) I'm very lucky
 
Hacking is important to us to give the horses variety and fittening (sp) work.

The hacking we have is reasonable, but all hacks involve a busy main road, (buses HGV's empty very noisy car transporters, dustbin lorries with lights flashing) so we tend to hack out in pairs. Fortunately it has a very wide verge that we tend to stick to. Weekends are worse on this road when there are less lorries but cars speeds increase to way above the speed limit:rolleyes:.

All of ours are expected to cope with this, but OH has a brilliant 'nanny' horse who spent the first 3 yrs of his life in a field next to a railway line trying to touch intercity trains with his nose for entertainment, he doesn't flinch at anything so all the others including the babies have learnt from him.

It was a great selling point when we sold sons pony recently, people who came to view were very impressed to see her hacking down this road without a problem.
 
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