Re: RC: What does Long Slow Distance mean to you?

[Truman Prevatt <tprevatt@mindspring.com>]

I'll give it a shot. Roger has pointed out Nancy Loving's book as a good place
to start for any new rider.

To me starting a new horse is miles and miles starting with mostly walk and a
little trot. Starting this out for just a few miles and gradually adding more
distance and substituting more slow and medium trot for the walk always
monitoring them to see that they are not being over stressed. My regiment is
maybe three times a week and then once or so working on skills such as
dressage. I feel that the dressage work is as important at this point as the
trotting.

As the horse progressed, faster trot will be added. As far as total miles that
really is a function on where you ride, e.g. if you ride in hilly or sandy
terrain you would use less distance than if you road on flat turf. Of course
you can use slow rides to substitute for training. I like to see about a year
of this as the basic foundation training.

I also like to start them out with a tiny hiny riding them, then a slightly
heavier person and then finally myself. At each weight increase, I would back
off the distance. After all the back has to be conditioned also.

T

guest@endurance.net wrote:

> Tami Lange tamitl67@yahoo.com
>
> A friend of mine and I have been talking about what Long Slow Distance
> Miles actually look like, we have differing opinions, what is yours...How
> many miles qualify?  What speed? How many weeks/months should you LSD a
> six year old arab that has been saddle trained for a year?  When should
> you graduate to a faster speed?  If you can answer these questions, please
> email me at tamitl67@yahoo.com   Thank you, Tami