Lessons from Ride Bear 2012

The stars finally aligned, and Fetti and I took part in our first 25-mile endurance ride in September 2012. It was a hot, sunny ride where Funder was kind enough to ride with me.  We finished, but in hindsight there was so much that could have gone better.  It took almost the full half-hour for Confetti to pulse down.  She did - eventually - but it took stripping tack + hosing her off + more time to manage it.  Clearly, we hadn't prepped as well as I thought.


Ride your own ride.  I have a pony with a pony walk.  She does not walk at normal-horse walk speed, let alone gaited horse or Arab-speed.  If they're all walking ahead, she's not going to keep up at a walk - she'll alternate walk-trot.  Not only is she working harder, her heart rate is going to stay up, and there is never a true 'break' for her.  It's not realistic to ask folks to stay at a slow walk, so Fetti needs to learn to walk politely by herself.

Even aside from the walk, I need to listen to her.  She's a smart horse who doesn't want a terribly elevated heart rate.  If she's refusing to go above a walk, I need to (for the most part) listen to her.

How do I improve on that?  I bought a heart monitor.  I will be using it to know when I can push (stubborn, opinionated pony) and when I can't (tired pony).  I'm hoping to do our next 25 at whatever speed she wants to go, and not try to stick with a group.




Train faster than you compete.  Somehow, I think I missed that part.  Most of our rides are done at Haflinger speed, a nice casual sitting trot.  That's not 5mph.  If I had to guess, I'd say 3.5mph, maybe 4.  Riding with our Tennessee Walker friend, we probably do get up to 5mph.  I can think of three horses we've ridden with off the top of my head that can go on a ride faster than that - an Arab whose riders and I keep vastly different schedules, Funder and Dixie, and a Thoroughbred/Quarter cross that I need to ride with more often!

How do I improve on that this year?  Ideally, we do a lot of training rides solo.  Works best if the pony will go above an irritated mincy walk for more than ten steps when headed out alone.  Still working on that part..  Currently, I've found that our little tiny back-woods trails allow us to be out by ourselves and traveling at a nice brisk endurance trot.  For the time being, it'll have to do.




Train in the conditions you'll be competing in.  Duh!  It was a hot, sunny ride.  Most of my conditioning rides last year were in the evenings and in the forest.  Very few were in 90 degree weather.


How do I improve on that?  On my weekdays off, I'll be riding in the afternoons this year!  Might do an evening ride also, but no more riding only in the evenings.




Clip.  I did a small clip job (lower half of neck + chest) about a month after the ride.  In hindsight, that might have been wise to do prior to the ride.  She was good and furry in October, and I imagine good and furry in September as well.

Speed and averages

I board at a self-care barn. We have dressage riders, Pony Club riders, die-hard Natural Horsemanship folks, gymkhana riders, people who just like to ride their horse, people whose horses are retired but used to ride them, people whose horses aren't rideable, people who aren't physically able to ride their horse. As far as endurance or even distance riders go, though, that's mostly me. A friend has ridden her Walker on the local 25 once. Other Haffies have done NATRC in the past.  Another girl on a borrowed horse would probably do a 25 with me, but has neither transportation nor saddle. Fetti and I can do our usual 6-mile loop to the Deck and back in two hours solo, hour and a half with another horse. It's a nice little loop as far as I'm concerned, but a full ride for most folks, and we're doing it much faster than most. Frankly, having Funder's Dixie set a faster pace than we could easily keep up was a bit of a surprise. I know all the charts online say that the average horse should have roughly a 5mph trot. I'm riding a pony with other ponies and a TWH. 'Average horse' doesn't hold much meaning. We do a lot of work on slowing down on the trail so that our riding partners can keep up. Alone, I have to push her for forwards, nevermind the extra-forwards I feel like I *should* be getting to have her quick enough. In all fairness, more than half the ride to the Deck is either somewhat steep uphills and/or steps, and maybe half the ride back - even on the other side of the loop - is a handful of steps and a few substantial downhills. Our flatter sections of the trail are heavily populated with hikers. Trail etiquette deems that we walk past the hikers, and Fetti is well trained: walk as we draw close, trot once we're a few steps past. With luck, we'll up our pace to an hour and a half to the Deck solo by the end of the year!