Good to see Tom Ivers on board. Tom it is time you stopped lurking and
joined in we are always glad to have your comments to bring us back to
reality. I do have some comments on you bit about heart rates and blood
lactate. Your field of endeavor has been quite constant in examples. Your
horses are of a standard for the most part and the riders are no doubt of a
close match in the weight component.
To take one of your race horses and with a jockey type of person on board I
would expect to see the results you describe. NOW, take that same horse and
put me on board weighing in at 215 ( damn near double the normal weight) and
see what happens to the lactate!! Bet you it zooms up.
That is where endurance riders get into trouble. That is why I always
qualify my statements that this is what I do or how my horse reacts because
I believe that there are so many variables that you cannot set down concrete
rules or postulates.
How I keep my horses and how I train and how I feed and how much I weigh all
are contributing factors in the equation.
I agree with you on the points about heart rates and work but then we must
modify it once again for the fact the race horse is on the level and has
constant footing where as the endurance horse has varying terrain and
footing. I will warrant the soft footing on the track would make an
endurance horse really work though.
To all the other readers, regarding high heart rates at the start of the
ride, I agree with Kat and we have found that in particular with a young
green horse, they will expend the energy one way or the other. Up and down
motion or fast forward motion. We have felt that you might as well cover the
ground, though you might not finish the ride, rather than fight a fractious
horse. Once or twice is all they seem to want to run and then things settle
out. Excitement at the start is easy to overcome though if the horse has
been well conditioned and ridden with others in training. It is the new
horse that is just starting and not really trained that gives problems.
Bob Morris
Morris Endurance Enterprises
Boise, ID