# Getting Started.



## gottatrot (Jan 9, 2011)

I hope I don't sound too negative here, that's not my style. But I have very strong opinions about over training...

If you have a 21 year old horse that was a pasture pet, starting out with a 15 mile ride is a fast way to get your horse injured and/or very sour on riding. I hope you're exaggerating or mistaken, since it's unlikely you went 15 miles in three hours if you went slow and also stopped for a break. You could cover that ground if you went for a slowish trot the entire time, but stopping to walk drops your averages quite a bit. 

Anyway, I'd say think of your horse as yourself going into training straight off being a couch potato. You would not start out with a 15 mile jog or even walk. You'd start out with two miles mixed walking and running, and you'd do it for several weeks before beginning to extend the distance a bit. Now if your horse has a history of being worked hard and has therefore developed strong tendons, ligaments, and bones, plus muscle memory of hard exercise, then you can progress faster to getting the horse in shape. But if this is the first time heading toward hard exercise, you need to go slowly and condition over months, because tendons, ligaments and bones take that long to strengthen and thicken for hard exercise. Especially your horse's back is going to suffer if you're going for many miles with lots of walking without building up to it properly.

Remember your horse is going to be very muscle sore starting out, even if all the tack fits perfectly. Giving a day or two to recover after your longest ride of the week (which after training for a month may get to be around 5 or 6 mile) will help the horse not get burned out about being asked to go out again when sore.


----------



## Rain Shadow (May 1, 2014)

I was using a GPS app on my phone, how accurate it is I'm not sure. But that's what it said. It does seem a bit much, but she's a very fast paced horse. I timed her walk at close to 4 mph. There is a mile stretch between two roads I took her on and at a nice forward walk she did it in 17 minutes. Her walk is faster than my friend's QH's western jog. A slow paced trot on her is effortlessly keeping up with gaited horses. 

She was a pasture pet, but a pacer. If she wasn't sleeping or eating she was walking up and down the fence line. So she's in far better shape then most pasture pets, or a lot of horses in light work. 

Personally I don't see 5 or 6 miles as a ride much less a training ride or a long one! I can pull any of our horses out of pasture and take them out on an walk/trot 10 mile ride and I've only had one horse come up lame or sore after a ride and that was a stone bruise. Horses around here are often taken out on 10-12 mile rides once or twice a week as their work except sitting in the pasture. 

So I find it odd that 6 miles is considered a lot for a horse. Star's very first trail ride under saddle was 5 miles. Regional difference perhaps?

She's not sore today! She was bucking and playing like crazy this morning. I only did some light schooling in the arena today an she was forward and happy to work.


----------



## MrsKD14 (Dec 11, 2015)

There are several great books out there on endurance and they all echo what Gottatrot said. It's easy to overtrain even a fit horse when going from one discipline to another. Having said that, just keep a close eye on her-we obviously don't know your individual horse. 

Distance riding can be highly addictive! Lol. I've always done it but didn't know until the past two or three years that it was an actual sport. I love it. Love the people. Love the animal's health being priority. And my boy is always looking over the next hill. He loves his job. 

Give yourself plenty of time. Get a heart rate monitor or stethoscope and learn use it to check how she pulses down. Try out your gear in all weather. Sort out your preferred rain gear and test it out. In short, test EVERYTHING. Camp in the yard with her to see how she handles that too. It's a lot more than just her fitness. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


----------



## gottatrot (Jan 9, 2011)

Rain Shadow said:


> She was a pasture pet, but a pacer. If she wasn't sleeping or eating she was walking up and down the fence line. So she's in far better shape then most pasture pets, or a lot of horses in light work.
> 
> Personally I don't see 5 or 6 miles as a ride much less a training ride or a long one! I can pull any of our horses out of pasture and take them out on an walk/trot 10 mile ride and I've only had one horse come up lame or sore after a ride and that was a stone bruise. Horses around here are often taken out on 10-12 mile rides once or twice a week as their work except sitting in the pasture.
> 
> ...


Even if your horse self-exercises in the pasture, it's not quite the same as going into formal work. That would be like people saying they walk around all day at work so therefore running a 5K without training should be easy. Not the case.
5 or 6 miles is not a lot for a horse, it's a lot for a horse that has not been conditioned yet. It's not a lot for a human either, but it's a lot for a human that is out of shape. Horses that are regularly taken out on 10-12 mile rides weekly are fit for it. A horse that has not been going out on rides at all (so you said) until two weeks ago is very out of shape. Have you ever tried walking 15 miles yourself? It's quite a long way. 

If your horse went out for 15 miles without gradually becoming fit for it, she is sore. She might not be lame, but she's absolutely muscle sore. Depending on her mind, she may be completely willing to work. That doesn't mean you shouldn't think about it and act with consideration for the muscle fiber breakdown and rebuilding that is going on in her body. Light exercise is good for muscle soreness, just as you might go for a walk to remove the stiffness after running a half marathon. 

I think a big part of endurance training is understanding how conditioning works and how your horse's body becomes more fit and strengthened for exercise over time. This is especially important if your horse is already over 20 years old.
I've gone on long rides with people who didn't condition their horses beforehand. They'd always treated horses this way and saw nothing wrong with it, and didn't notice the signs that their horses were out of shape. The horses sweated more than they should have, had periods of hard breathing where fit horses would not have, and I'm sure their heart rates reflected their fitness level. As an athlete, I felt a lot of sympathy for the horses. But definitely it put the horses at risk for injuring themselves; when fatigued a horse can step wrong, weak tendons can tear, and I've even known people whose horses have broken bones from being asked to do too much too soon.

Here are some good links:
Conditioning for endurance riding - Part I â€¢ Endurance Riding â€¢ Endurance 101 and Beyond
https://perseveranceendurancehorses.wordpress.com/2012/10/17/endurance-training/


----------



## MrsKD14 (Dec 11, 2015)

I just reread this and realized you were talking about a pasture horse. Chalk it up to me being on here late late at night. 

Take it slow. Some rides offer introductory rides. The NATRC has the same distance spread over two days at a much slower pace. Your horse may gain aerobic fitness fast, but the tendons and ligaments take much longer. Sure, she may be able to go out and do it, but at what cost to her long term soundness? 

Running the fence is much different than trotting trails with the weight of a rider and gear. 

We're not trying to damper your enthusiasm, but rather save your enthusiasm from being flattened by an unsound horse. [emoji6] 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


----------



## phantomhorse13 (Feb 18, 2011)

You can check out the AERC website's Getting Started section and the Old Dominion's Starting Out section. There are also a lot of Green Bean groups on the book of faces (you can pm me for details on those).

I see that you are in Florida, so suspect your terrain (or lack there of, assuming its not flooded) contributes to your ability to cover more ground than the rest of us at a 'slow' pace. I had never ridden in Florida until recently and the difference is amazing!


----------

