Re: Hw vs Fw

[CMKSAGEHIL <CMKSAGEHIL@aol.com>]

I remember an article many years ago written by Cliff Lewis entitled "Rocks,
Downhill, and Darkness--A Fat Man's Secret Weapons."  One of the things that
Cliff tried was that he took two horses and a top-notch runner friend, and
they tried some informal experiments over several days on a long training hill
(10 or 12 miles, if I remember right, with a noticeable, steady grade).  Cliff
would ride one horse, and his friend would lead the other horse and run.  They
did comparisons going up the hill, and going down the hill, and also switched
horses and repeated the performance, to rule out differences between horses.
The result?  Going up the hill, it always took the horse packing Cliff longer
to have his pulse drop to whatever criterion they were using, sometimes by
5-10 minutes or so.  Going downhill, the horses recovered at approximately the
same rate, regardless of which one had the heavyweight on him.  Makes
sense--takes more effort to defy gravity.  I DO think heavyweights need to use
different ride strategies sometimes...

Heidi