Re: RC: Arab or TWH

[SandyDSA@aol.com]

In a message dated 4/12/99 11:59:15 PM Pacific Daylight Time, 
Thiessej@aol.com writes:

<< oose the Saddlebred. I believe that 
 the cross is often better than either breed. I have seen a lot of Arabs that 
 that have the heart and drive to do endurance but not the leg or foot to do 
 the work. They need a lot more slow conditioning to build up their legs to 
do 
 a 50 mile ride than a gaited breed.  >>
Oh MY! You haven't met our Arabians - or many others that we know, have owned 
have looked at - and been beaten by! Hard-footed, huge trotting - and smooth, 
athletic, and esily conditioned. Our own stallion after a suspensory pull, 
was back at 50's in 6 WEEKS! and we did NOT hurry him. His metabolics were 
just astonishing, which led us to investigate the why - as exercise 
physiologists, my husband and I are fascinated by the metabolic rehab of 
athletes of every kind. Having had a number of other breed over the years - 
Tbreds, Qu-horses, Connemaras, grades, Icelandics, and ONE Saddlebred (rode 
numerous others), there was no doubt left that, much like certain human 
athletes, there are inherent qualities in Arabians that make them as a BREED 
- with exceptions both ways of course - the ideal breed for distance.  This 
was not based upon sinply watching or riding a few, but on considerable 
investigation and perusing others' research as well. Hate to say it but 
horses are easier to study from a metabolic perspective than people! as a 
result, history and a profound majority of the research testifies to the 
Arabians' significant superiority in the field of distance events. 

Ceratinly, as former show horse owners (and DON'T get me started on THAT) we 
have seen a plethora of bad-legged, weinie footed Arabians - the crappy 
hocks, skinny necks, poor feet and even some real butt-ugly heads! - and 
those are the exceptions you hear about. Of course they would not be 
candidates for endurance WITH some exceptions :)!

The bottom line is that endurance riders who do manage to compete with sucess 
year after year on the same horse generally are on...Arabians. While having 
an Arabian is no guarantee of success, it is certainly a genetic leg up on 
the competition on just about any other breed. Quite simply, the stats bear 
this out. :)
s


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