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> I read all this talk about flying down hill.  With 65% of a horse's
> weight  being on the front end, along with the rest pushing him with
> gravity, I have  never thought that running down hill is good for the
> horse and dangerous for the  rider.  Now I guess it depends on one's
> definition of a hill but where I live  a hill is a mountain.  You
> continue running down hills and I will eventually  pass you going up the
> next hill or at the vet check.  And I do have a Rocky  Mountain who also
> is great at going down hill at my speed.
Phil, keep in mind that the figure you quoted is for a horse standing
still.  When the horse is in motion, the dynamics of weight and balance
change considerably.  An athletic horse carries much more weight on his
hindquarters when he is in motion than when he is standing still.  All of
the power comes through the hindquarters.  If a horse is heavy on the
forehand, he is not free to move well, and is certainly not a good
candidate for going rapidly downhill with safety!  A good downhill horse
is nearly level, with his hind end truly taking the weight and his front
end literally just providing direction.  The part of the horse that gets
sore if he does more downhill than he is conditioned to do is the backs of
his thighs--have seen horses cramp there more than once from doing more
downhill work than they are used to.

And the main reason for taking advantage of downhills IS to be able to be
the first one out of the vet checks--a strategy that has worked for me for
years.  By going more slowly UP where it takes a great deal of work and
energy to lift horse and rider against gravity, and by utilizing gravity,
the horse does not have to work NEAR as hard.  My best downhill horses are
also the best I've ridden for coming into vet checks already down to
criteria--and I suspect that their ability to conserve energy by making
time going downhill where it is less work is at least one factor
contributing to this.

Heidi



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