If you want your horse to perform well or participate in athletics, it is crucial to work on its fitness. Keeping your horse in top shape ensures you can ride for longer before the horse experiences heavy breathing and sweating. Following a suitable fitness, the procedure ensures the efficient building of muscular and cardiovascular strength. Here are various tips on keeping your horse in top shape.
Trail Riding
Your horse’s fitness can be enhanced through trail riding. If your horse is unfit, you can begin with a walk of up to one hour. With time, your horse will be able to take longer and faster strides. After the horse can comfortably take longer stretches, you can increase the distance. This is crucial for horses that are training for events.
Interval Training
Interval exercises help to keep your horse in top shape. It involves replacing the lengthy low-intensity sessions with shorter high-intensity workouts. However, the high-intensity exercises should be followed by a session of rest. As you continue training your horse, you should increase sessions for intense activities and reduce rest periods. You should not focus on the horse’s speed but ensure it keeps a good rhythm that helps build fitness.
Hill Work
Hill work is a crucial strategy for ensuring your horse is fit. During hill work, your horse goes up and down the hills at different speeds. This helps to work out various parts of your horse’s body. Running up a hill and walking down improves your horse’s cardiovascular fitness. Walking and trotting up a hill helps to tone and increase muscle strength.
Poles and Gymnastics
Poles and gymnastics are ideal ways of improving your horse’s fitness. However, a horse does not require big jumps. Keeping jumps at a low level ensures your horse does not strain. If you are nervous, you can do pole work rides while allowing your horse to jump freely over gymnastics.
Lastly, it is essential to note that pole work and gymnastics serve various purposes. They include increasing speed for dressage horses, working different muscles, and improving fitness. As the horse becomes fitter, you can increase the training duration.