Re: RC: Climate and Altitude changes

[Tivers@aol.com]

In a message dated 9/6/00 8:54:33 PM Pacific Daylight Time, 
robandcarla@hotmail.com writes:

<< I was kind of wondering if you plan on going to rides that are several 
 Hundreds of miles away say from coast to coast how much time would be good 
 to give your horse time to adjust? If you do say a hundred or a multiday how 
 much recovery time would you give before hauling back? I remeber something 
 maybe Steph and Krusty was in France about a week or two? >>

Either you ship in and race immediately, or you have to take some serious 
time, 2 or 3 weeks--to get acclimated. After 2 or three days, the shockwave 
hits.. Sometimes you get a rebound in about a week, but not to 100%. 

After a race, you'll get the best rebound with several doses of carbs and 
electrolytes over the first few hours of recovery--hopefully preventing the 
horse from going into catabolism, where hormones and enzymes are released to 
rip up good tissue to make repairs. If that happens, then you're stuck for at 
least 48 hours before recovery  (rebuilding) can begin. When the horse 
returns to pre-race body weight, much of the recovery has been accomplished, 
but there is still a depressed immune system. Vita-Flex makes a product 
called GlytaSyn that is excellent for an acute shoring up of the immune 
system--also good in normal doses long term. Glutamine and lactoferrin are 
two active ingredients. 

ti