I wasn't using the pulse checks we got, which on the hot, humid ride were mostly in the 50'2 -60. I asked the individual rider what his horses resting pulse was, normally, like at home. Rascal has a resting pulse of 33, so I was sort of doing a comparison study to see how his heart rate compared to the various horses I'd seen that day . Which I was surprised to find only two had resting pulses in the 30's. The lowest being 36. They may have been fitter than him, I think he just has a good genes. Laurie
----- Original Message -----
From: Heidi Smith
Sent: Wednesday, October 23, 2002 7:21 AM
To: Laurie Durgin; Lysane Cree; ridecamp@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [RC] Heart rate at CTR
>That would be interesting since resting pulses for a lot of horses isn't below 40. As a side note while scribing for the vet check at Liberty Run I asked alot of riders what their horses resting pulse was. 36-52 was the range.
Actually, I've seen resting normals as low as 24 or so. The ability to remain calm and have the pulse reflect the horse's true resting normal is a trait that is even more important to CTR horses than to endurance horses. Don't forget that unless horses are well-trained to stay calm on check-in, what you see at check-in at an endurance ride may not reflect the horse's true resting pulse. For instance, 52 is even above anything that would be considered to be clinically normal at rest. If a horse presented to me with a 52 pulse and was calm and quiet, I'd suspect a problem brewing, like a mild colic or whatever. However, if the horse is antsing around and fussing because his buddy just left, or because he's never been in a crowd, or because he is anticipating, then he has good reason to be 52, and it raises no alarms. You'll find that if you follow the good horses and re-pulse them at the ends of holds, after the adrenaline has subsided, many recover well down into the 40's, even at endurance rides.
Heidi
