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Re: [RC] Advice please - Truman PrevattWhat you didn't say is has a lot to bear on the issue. How old is the horse? How long have you been riding him "steady?"You ask 10 people about how much you should ride and you will probably get 10 answers - so here goes with one. There are a couple of phases of training. The furst is LSD (long slow distance). That is where you build a base. If the horse is 8 years old with 3 years of a lot of riding - that phase can go fairly quickly because there is some base there. If he is a 5 yo with little riding that could take maybe a year. You can use rides as part of this process. CTR's are good during this process because they require a consistent pace and this teaches the horse (and rider) to go for mile after mile at a 6.2 mph pace. The next phase you can mix the training up to add some speed - so you won't have to take 9 hours to do a 50. If you take 9 hours it is because you choose to. After mayber 3 good years (2 if the horse starts out with a good base) you should have a strong horse in prime shape. Here you can modify the training for specifics. Rest between rides is very important. You can over train. Arena work is important - you what the horse to know ques, be balanced, etc. When I started I rode 4 days a week on the trail and 2 days a week in basic dressage and jumping training to get a base. My horse was 7 when I started this. The trail rides weren't that long - maybe 7 miles but we built up so we were trotting and cantering all of it. After about a year - for lots of reasons one being work - I backed off to three times riding a week plus some arena work. Two were about 5-7 miles the other was a longer ride on the weekend - 20 to 25 miles. I suspect I never rode more than 35 miles a week and many weeks not that far. That was fine for getting and keeping a horse in shape to do 100's. If your desire is to win FEI events - your training will have to be more intense. If your goals is to go out and compete in 50's and even 100's I found 35 miles a week of conditioning plus some arenna work is sufficient. Of course this depends on the individual horse and your mileage may vary. Truman Ridecamp Guest wrote: Please Reply to: Cindy Rodd crodd22@xxxxxxxxxxx or ridecamp@xxxxxxxxxxxxx ========================================== -- "Mathematics may be defined as the subject in which we never know what we are talking about, nor whether what we are saying is true." - Bertrand Russell =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Ridecamp is a service of Endurance Net, http://www.endurance.net. Information, Policy, Disclaimer: http://www.endurance.net/Ridecamp Subscribe/Unsubscribe http://www.endurance.net/ridecamp/logon.asp Ride Long and Ride Safe!! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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