Distance And Injury/Finale

The minimum injury prevention formula proposed on this blog is:

4f x 12.5 sec/f every 7 days

The idea is that to stay in the game we need to keep the horse running.

The in season performance workout looked at last post was?

Tues: 3f in :35.5
Sun. 8f in :13.5
Wed. 3f in 35.5
Sun: Race 1 1/16 mile

Will this produce fracture resistance? Will it produce FR if the horse races only once a month, or every 3 weeks?

My opinion is yes, although its a way less than comfortable yes for a number of reason. This is an in season w/o and we presume, of course, that we have an FR horse going in. The Q becomes then, will this routine maintain FR?

I think that it would for a good long while, even were the horse to race only once a month, and certainly if it races once every two weeks. Yet, I am uncomfortable with this routine, although noting that while I've considered it, done it for short periods, I have yet to try something like this over a longer period for reasons that follow.

Note that the mile in :13.5s is way short of being an FR workout by my definitions. Without writing another book, that work, while certainly it will benefit tendon/ligament strength, cardiovascular endurance and several other parameters of exercise physiology, it simply fails to engage the FR processes by my definitions. Thus this routine is left with one 3f FR w/o week. That's on the barest edge, imo, even if we factor in the racing. Myself, I'd prefer to formulate an FR routine I consider completely safe. I'd be uncomfortable with this one, and particularly so if I were riding the horse.

The routine also skirts on the borders of being too much by my definitions. Those :35.5s are almost 5f works and then with more warm up and warm down. For reasons previously elaborated I believe the Preston Burch cycle of every 3 day breezing is--long term--too much. You may get away with the Burch w/o for several months, but eventually the number of destroyed bone cells will be too many in some body part and the horse is going to fracture. Even in his own book Burch's horses fail to last long term. If you have the book, check it out.

If it's too much, the solution, you say, is to reduce the distances. Do 2f spurts instead of 3f and maybe 7f instead of 8f on Sundays. Again, since the w/o already was barely skirting FR, while the lesser distances may take the horse out of the realm of doing too much, and might indeed be beneficial in terms of performance, those w/os would fail to maintain long term FR imo, even with the racing. Thus, my choice might be to consider the many other possibilities.

The above is other than my last word on this type of w/o schematic. I posted previously that I have considered the same routine but with some variations that I will get to when I get to performance.

Finish by stating that I am other than a fan of changing up distances. Numerous reasons that will require a future post. In terms of distance, there's the FR thing, but there's also the soft injury thing. We need consider both. Soft tissue causes us to think "longer and slower". FR causes us to think--at least 4f in :12.5. My guess is the correct and safe (as opposed to being on"the bare edge of FR") is more than 4f. How much more depends on the rest of the program, and how far the horse is racing--e.g. I think it's very possible, and would be interesting, to train a 6f horse strictly on a routine of frequent :35s. More on this when I get to performance.
Training
Tues. 3/1. Ground conditions--1st day of the thaw--permit only 10 min walk under tack.