A Word On Soft Tissue Injury And Age
Briefly, on a couple of subjects which each might serve as entire chapters.
1. Soft Tissue Injuries, meaning tendons, ligaments and muscles. Last post stated my own fairly firm conviction that enough 4f breezes at the right speeds and frequency will eventually get the horse to FR. How many of such works might be sufficient to pronounce the cannon bones "ready" I will have to leave to individual discretion, trusting, for reasons that follow, that each trainer would pass on the 4f works, and certainly exceed the 4f distance significantly, as appropriate and the racing situation requires.
I have limited discussion to fractures and bones, though "injury prevention", needless to say, includes avoiding every sort of injury including fractures, bowed tendons, suspensories, pulled sesamoids, knee chips, and so on. RR Rule #1, --never do anything with the horse unless you are 100% sure that it can be done without injury--is all encompassing requiring religious observance. And, the important corollary--when in (any) doubt, back off.
My own view, and again this is cursory, is that probably tendons and ligaments, to stay sound and observe Rule #1 above, require works near racing distance. I initially concentrate on protecting sesamoids, but have also learned the hard way that you better, every single day, also consider avoiding every stupidity to prevent that unexpected bow or suspensory injury.
Soft tissue injuries are probably, much more readily than bones, injured by such as rider stupidity, failure of appropriate warm up, failure to change leads, changing weights on the horse, any surprise, etc. etc.
2. Age. Bill Pressey brought this up in comment to last post--how might distance the horse MUST breeze for FR be affected by age. My inexpert answer would involve a subject I have to date avoided for fear it would require another 6 months of posts for full discussion--detraining. How quickly does the older horse lose FR during down time, and what need be done to restore the older horse to FR when (and if) FR is lost.
If we define detraining for this purpose narrowly to bones only, and say that detraining is any reduction of fracture resistance, I believe detraining probably commences within 7 days of the last FR appropriate breeze, and this is for horses of any age. Why?
My theories--without thinking too deeply on the subject for the moment--probably involve on-going "bone destruction" or resorption by the osteoclasts. We know there is a continual removal of the mineral matrix and breaking up of the organic bone by these little critters who at work 100% of the time.
By my rough estimate (was it in the 9/07 or the 9/08 posts?) at any given moment 4% of the bone matrix is undergoing resorption, and 4% of the existing matrix will be destroyed per week!. We may thus calculate that the older horse within 6 months of inactivity or lack of appropriate FR exercise will have pasture ornament bone architecture instead of FR bones.
Possibly the 4% rule can also be applied to the need for appropriate FR type work in any layoff from breezing and racing--e.g. assuming you have an FR horse that raced yesterday, within 7 days 4% of that benefit will be gone. If we fail to breeze appropriately the next week the horse will lose another 4% and so on.
Does the older FR horse need to work in 4f? My thoughts would be that certainly you can vary the works and dip below 4f provided that you are mindful of an "average" work that needs to be done over time, AND also mindful that your 3f or 2f work, while sufficient for performance, fast twitch muscle work and so on, will be insufficient in terms of FR and needs to be made up at some point. The bottom line to me--if, as such as Zito--you keep ignoring appropriate FR distance and the other FR variables, eventually the horse is likely to fracture, regardless of age. Again, this assumes dirt surface, USA style racing.
Training:
Fri. 2/18: 4 times up and down the hill mostly trot.
Sat. 2/19: riderless only 4 or 5 1f bursts in light mud.
Sun. 2/20: riderless 4 or 5 1f full speed bursts in the paddock + tack work--4 times trot-gallop up and down the hill.
1. Soft Tissue Injuries, meaning tendons, ligaments and muscles. Last post stated my own fairly firm conviction that enough 4f breezes at the right speeds and frequency will eventually get the horse to FR. How many of such works might be sufficient to pronounce the cannon bones "ready" I will have to leave to individual discretion, trusting, for reasons that follow, that each trainer would pass on the 4f works, and certainly exceed the 4f distance significantly, as appropriate and the racing situation requires.
I have limited discussion to fractures and bones, though "injury prevention", needless to say, includes avoiding every sort of injury including fractures, bowed tendons, suspensories, pulled sesamoids, knee chips, and so on. RR Rule #1, --never do anything with the horse unless you are 100% sure that it can be done without injury--is all encompassing requiring religious observance. And, the important corollary--when in (any) doubt, back off.
My own view, and again this is cursory, is that probably tendons and ligaments, to stay sound and observe Rule #1 above, require works near racing distance. I initially concentrate on protecting sesamoids, but have also learned the hard way that you better, every single day, also consider avoiding every stupidity to prevent that unexpected bow or suspensory injury.
Soft tissue injuries are probably, much more readily than bones, injured by such as rider stupidity, failure of appropriate warm up, failure to change leads, changing weights on the horse, any surprise, etc. etc.
2. Age. Bill Pressey brought this up in comment to last post--how might distance the horse MUST breeze for FR be affected by age. My inexpert answer would involve a subject I have to date avoided for fear it would require another 6 months of posts for full discussion--detraining. How quickly does the older horse lose FR during down time, and what need be done to restore the older horse to FR when (and if) FR is lost.
If we define detraining for this purpose narrowly to bones only, and say that detraining is any reduction of fracture resistance, I believe detraining probably commences within 7 days of the last FR appropriate breeze, and this is for horses of any age. Why?
My theories--without thinking too deeply on the subject for the moment--probably involve on-going "bone destruction" or resorption by the osteoclasts. We know there is a continual removal of the mineral matrix and breaking up of the organic bone by these little critters who at work 100% of the time.
By my rough estimate (was it in the 9/07 or the 9/08 posts?) at any given moment 4% of the bone matrix is undergoing resorption, and 4% of the existing matrix will be destroyed per week!. We may thus calculate that the older horse within 6 months of inactivity or lack of appropriate FR exercise will have pasture ornament bone architecture instead of FR bones.
Possibly the 4% rule can also be applied to the need for appropriate FR type work in any layoff from breezing and racing--e.g. assuming you have an FR horse that raced yesterday, within 7 days 4% of that benefit will be gone. If we fail to breeze appropriately the next week the horse will lose another 4% and so on.
Does the older FR horse need to work in 4f? My thoughts would be that certainly you can vary the works and dip below 4f provided that you are mindful of an "average" work that needs to be done over time, AND also mindful that your 3f or 2f work, while sufficient for performance, fast twitch muscle work and so on, will be insufficient in terms of FR and needs to be made up at some point. The bottom line to me--if, as such as Zito--you keep ignoring appropriate FR distance and the other FR variables, eventually the horse is likely to fracture, regardless of age. Again, this assumes dirt surface, USA style racing.
Training:
Fri. 2/18: 4 times up and down the hill mostly trot.
Sat. 2/19: riderless only 4 or 5 1f bursts in light mud.
Sun. 2/20: riderless 4 or 5 1f full speed bursts in the paddock + tack work--4 times trot-gallop up and down the hill.
posted by rather rapid at
9:00 AM
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