Injury Causing VARIABLES In Training

Every athletic coach can point to specific factors affecting performance, and with horses, injuries. Factors cause injuries. I like the sound of that. It's therefore other than "it just happens" or "that's racing".

I call the injury causing factors "variables", and do so for a reason. Variables are changeables or things we may change, meaning also that variables are things we can control. And so, drumroll please! How do we prevent injuries? Please say it with me "we prevent injuries by CONTROLLING THE VARIABLES".

So, we're sending a horse to the track. Let's presume it's a D.W. Lukas horse. Goes to the track 22 times a month. We can quibble over DW's spacing of the gallops, but, it's enough.

What are we thinking as the horse heads out, and what variables do we consider in terms of injuries?

I've already covered a few:
shoeing
track surface
riders
warm ups

And of course animal husbandry (think Mary The Twit, last post), nutrition, rest (did some idiot keep 'em up all night), and so on.

But, rider's up, horse heading out, what variables do we consider?

1. The state and condition of the animal--what has it done yesterday, last week and month, what will it do tomorrow, etc.
2. Today's ideal distance, speed, and how far are we going fast?
3. What do we need in the warm up.
4. Alternative plans: if things go awry, leads, horse health during workout, what happens if the horse goes too fast in one part of w/o, or too slow in another, monitoring in general.
5. How do we leave the track? It matters.

and, last but hardly least, how to communicate all this to my Hall of Fame jock (it's a Lukas horse, mind you). Possibly biggest variable of all: rider control. Absolutely got to have it. I'll expound, next posts.

Training: Well, it failed to happen yesterday. Skipped the ground conditions. I'll do a complete training post soon and catch up with what's happening at the farm.