When competing this way, I give my horse and myself, one week off. I then would ride the next weekend and perhaps lightly on Tuesday. I found that my horses have gained condition throughout the season with this type of schedule.
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I kind of mentioned this a while back and kind of got flamed for it. But I consider doing a competition just another bump up in the conditioning. Unless you have run the horse to death at a ride in which case you may have taken a giant stride backwards.
If I am getting ready to do a ride and my last one was just a couple weeks previous I may take my horse out for what I call "let's just see how you are moving out" type of ride. When competing that close together if I have done the ground work in the spring I don't feel like I need to "condition", I just need to make sure mare is sound, forward, edpp, and good to go. Now that may still be an 8 to 12 mile ride, but I don't push for conditioning I work for steady down the trail type movement. Which is mostly what I want to accomplish at the next ride.
