Ridecamp: Re: [RC] leasing and how many days a week do you ride for a 25?

I would not recommend that you ride that often. Of course it depends on the length and relative difficulty of the ride as to how often. I would probably start with five or so miles of slow to moderately paced trail work, depending on the condition of the horse. Maybe twice during the week and then a longer ride on the weekend. Take a few weeks to work up to moderate to faster paced trail work. Perhaps four or five hours on the weekend ride, and maybe two hours during the week. Try to find varying terrain with some gentle hills and perhaps steep ones of short duration to start. Even walking up the steep hills is difficult work in the beginning and is good for building cardio vascular fitness.

For goodness sake, don't get so ambitious that you override your horse. You want her to enjoy going out with you. I think some people make the mistake of making it drudgery for themselves and the horse. 25 miles should not be difficult for a horse that has been conditioned properly. Remember that you have plenty of time and just try to maintain a conistent pace rather than rushing and walking and speeding up again. This is also harder on the horse.

I think it would be well worth your while to invest in some of the books on the market written specifically for endurance and read the AERC handbook. It gives quite a bit of information.

Most valuable of all assets is to find an experienced endurance rider and go out for rides with them. It is amazing how much you will learn just by enjoying a day on the trail with them. Once conditioned, it should not be necessary to concentrate so on how often you train. If you have built condition slowly, and if you are entering endurance rides on a fairly regular basis, the rides themselves will serve to help maintain condition and you can back off of concentrating on training several days a week.

....and most important of all......enjoy your time with your horse.

Pat

----- Original Message -----

From: SunsetOvrC@xxxxxxx

To: ridecamp@xxxxxxxxxxxxx

Sent: Wednesday, August 07, 2002 12:34 AM

Subject: Re: [RC] leasing and how many days a week do you ride for a 25?

Well, the lease thing fell through with my horse.  I was going to put an ad in the paper, but I'm having second thoughts.  I have spent a lot of time training this mare, and would hate to have someone screw that up.  I want to do a 25 in about 3 months.  I have read that I need to be riding 5 days a week.  Does anyone agree/disagree with this?
Pamela