Re: Endurance horses and eating

MS LOUISE D BURTON (XXDU78A@prodigy.com)
Sun, 30 Nov 1997 23:12:32, -0500

I was hoping someone else would write in about this....
Yikes!
I'm glad the diet on the Zone works for some people, but PLEASE don't use
this idea on a very hard working animal like a horse!!! HE IS NOT ON A
DIET!! Susan's and Tom's and other great animal nutritionists on this list
have excellent working ideas on endurance horse nutrition.
Louise Burton
Firedance Farms Arabians
OK
<<<<To everyone who has had a question about how to feed a horse or what to
feed a horse I would like to direct your attention to a book concerned
with human nutrition. The book is Enter the Zone by Barry Sears, Ph.D.
He's a research biochemist who studied the effects of protein,
carbohydrate and fat intake on hormone levels specifically and health in
general.

What he found out has some interesting parallels to what people talk
about with their horses. Not that human and horse nutrition are
isomorphic but there is so much that is interesting between the two that
I thought some might enjoy the book.

He found that:
1. Americans consume far too many carbohydrates in proportion to the
amount of fat and protein they eat. We also consume far too much food
for our activity level, period. Obesity is on the rise.
2. Most of the fat we consume is of the wrong type.
3. One should eat no more protein than is necessary to maintain lean
body mass at a particular activity level and this is easily calculable.
4. A body that uses fat for most of its energy needs is far more
efficient, bio-chemically, than one that uses carbohydrates and much
healthier.
5. You must go no more than five hours without eating.
6. And much more but thats why he wrote a book.