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RE: [SPAM] [RC] Competing WITHOUT e-lytes - heidiIf the horse is sweating and losing salts, minerals etc. How are they replenished without the use of e-lytes? Is the horse tapping into his reserves, deriving it from food he is eating at checks or in lay man's terms how are they replaced throughout a ride? Let's say in an ideal world the horse is a good drinker and he drinks early in a ride and throughout the day. But, with it being just plain water, how does that play into replenishing the minerals? A horse has a tremendous reserve in his hindgut. It holds GALLONS of slurry, and in the process of turning that into little road apples, the fluid (which is NOT just water, but also contains e-lytes, etc.) is absorbed. And while he may drink plain water, the horses I've ridden that do well with no e-lytes uniformly EAT. Forages in particular replenish quite a bit of e-lytes. People have been very diligent about calculating the e-lytes that a horse loses during ride day. But not many have been diligent about calculating what a horse consumes in natural feedstuffs. Sometime in the past, Susan G gave some figures for a few specific e-lytes in some sorts of hay, if memory serves. And while a horse may not entirely replace what he sweats out on ride day in his forage, given his reserve and his intake, he doesn't get into trouble. The foam in the sweat has little to do with e-lytes. But although I don't know of any supportive research about gaining efficiency of e-lytes in sweating when gaining fitness, I know that one can TASTE the difference in the sweat of a fit horse vs an unfit horse. Likewise, fit horses don't tend to get the salt residue on their hair when the sweat evaporates, as unfit horses do. So there IS some truth to the fact that fitness is an issue. That said, there is a tremendous difference in individuals, not only in their ability to dilute their sweat, but also in their willingness to EAT during rides. And the EATING has to do with a lot more than e-lytes--it also has to do with maintaining energy levels, which is crucial, particularly as you go longer distances. You also mention that your horse is nervous--this is a negative factor, too, because he depletes himself in excess of what he would for just the exercise he does. Sometimes you can micromanage horses that don't choose to manage themselves (or don't have the ability to manage themselves)--but it is a real pain to do so, and personally, I think you always walk a fine line with those horses if you choose to be really competitive with them. Some people have been successful in altering the nervous aspect of some horses by lots and lots of SLOW miles. Multidays are a thought. Hope this helps. Heidi =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Ridecamp is a service of Endurance Net, http://www.endurance.net. Information, Policy, Disclaimer: http://www.endurance.net/Ridecamp Subscribe/Unsubscribe http://www.endurance.net/ridecamp/logon.asp Ride Long and Ride Safe!! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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