The Importance of Fast Work?!!

sjp1

sjp1

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Sep 14, 2009
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Well sadly for the past fortnight for one reason or another I have done no fast work with Tobes at all.

Consequently he has actually been super spooky, very naughty, nappy and had his back up A LOT. So much so that when hacking back from the arena yesterday morning he was exceptionally silly and irrational which caused me to get cross and really smack him very hard with my dressage whip when going up the track as he was refusing to go past something that he has been past a hundred times. I had just had enough I think of his back up, spooking at nonsense and refusal to go past silly things.

This did focus his mind and he got on with the job in front with little issue after that.

I HATE having to get cross enough to do this. I do blame myself that I have not done enough fast work with him and this has caused the sillyness - but WHY???!!!
 
Gems like that too - spooky and silly if she's not had fast work in. More work she's in the better she is but then you trade off her fitness so when she's worked less due to other commitments but she's fit, she's a nightmare!
 
I don't do a lot of fast work at all! We hack at the weekends if we are not competing but if IH is with me riding Chanter we don't go fast because Chanter can't and he also can't trot. Our hacking is great but it is very hill and woods so not a lot of it can be cantered on and the hills are so steep you can't even trot them properly.

The more I hack the less spooky he is but it is not fast work. He is super fit and there is only 1 or 2 horses on the yard I can hack out with over any distance because the rest of the horses are not fit enough to either cope with the terrain or the distance I like to go.
 
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Mine doesnt know what gallop is, she has huge fields and pals any blasts she may want.
They do their morning run around, I know this as so many people tell me but I keep missing photos.
My terrain means you can do a steady or extended canter but no fast work as its undulating hills. Every directions its hill work so great for toning muscles and tendons though.
 
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Do you know I've never heard of the concept of fast work keeping horses sane, work yes, but not fast work in particular. However now you've mentioned it I realise I do sometimes say to Raf "what you need is a good gallop young man!" - not that he does anything terrible, he just feels a bit like a coiled spring.

Also could possibly explain why my friend's rather tricky horse is so much calmer and easier to ride since she has got her confidence back enough to go cantering in the stubble this season. He is worked regularly because he has skeletal problems so has to keep up his muscle tone, but until recently never cantered out in the open.

The horses on our yard are in quite small paddocks, so although they do have a gallop round (well Jack doesn't unless he's made to, it gets in the way of eating) it's not like NF's set up where they can go for a proper blast.
 
Jess needs a blast once in a while, thankfully she isnt one who needs it often. Bo used to need it more the more I did it with him, like he got in the habit then fell apart when the routine changed, that was very much his nature though
 
We don't do a lot of fast work and have never heard this proposed as a theory. The RS horses/ponies will get an ocassional extended canter round a field but mainly work in the arena. The tbs seldom work in gallop except when going xc however their standard prework warm up is several laps of the school on each rein in forward canter and light seat which tends to get them mentally relaxed and their backs down. Perhaps play around with how you warm up??
 
We don't have that many tracks that are safe to gallop on. I do endurance type training eg. a lot of trotting and cantering but not like 'superfast'. Mine is def less spooky when we go at a decent pace but I never heard of 'fast work' helping horses be less spooky? if anything it might heat some of the up?
 
Gosh, I've been so lucky.... all the ones I have owned can just be left to graze, pulled in and ridden occasionally with no change in their personality. Obviously we match the workload to how long they have been resting, but they have never played up. Sometimes they get a bit fizzy in spring, but we know that it is temporary whilst the grass is very rich.
 
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Well, I am no guru on it all, but I know that if I am going to do anything vaguely exciting which would include fun rides or even shows, then if I haven't worked him fairly hard which for him (as he is pretty fit) would include several good fast rides, then he is not easy.

Having not done any proper hard work with him in the last ten days he was ghastly when we arrived and I got on him, back up and I had to be very careful as anything would have caused him to go into one.

After that, two hours tied up behind the trailer seemed to calm him down and once we did another warm up he was a different horse.

However, I don't always have a spare two hours to bore him into it, and won't be going on fun ride this next weekend as haven't got enough time with work etc to take him on some long fast rides.

I do know I am not the only person to have this problem as TB on the yard also is exceptionally bucky on fun rides when she hasn't had enough work, but amazed that none of you have the same issue when going on some long and exciting ride where people are passing you, or even at show where people seem to insist on bombing around the warm up area. Perhaps its just our horses!!!

Edited to add we live in Devon - VERY steep hills - and we are pretty much hapy hackers. We do trot on up hills - doesn't help us, or TB!!!
 
So the hacking back from the arena was on your way home from a show? That's understandable though as he may have still been a bit plugged in?

I know I can take mine in the school a 1000 times but the 1001th time could be the one that she spooks at something she hasn't bothered with before. That's horses for you.
 
Ginger is a nightmare in busy warm up areas. he tucks his bum under and shots forward very fast he will also buck in the canter but it does not matter it I have hacked the day before the day before that or everyday for a week he will be just the same. That is just the way he is.

Plus fast work is not the answer for him getting him thinking and working correctly and more importantly listening to me. So before I take him somewhere were I want that edge taken off I make him work hard but in the school.

If I want him calmer I can lunge him first but then I run the risk of taking the that edge off him that he needs to get that little bit extra marks.

I know full well a fun ride with him is hard work he is a ex racer after all.
 
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I agree with OBC and it depends very much what the horse is used to doing. If Tobes is used to doing lots of fast work then of course he's going to be a bit sharper when he hasn't done any. Ours would be the same after a quiet week - but for them it's not really about fast work, just the fact that they are used to a busy and varied workload. We don't get to do galloping / long canters out hacking as it's all roadwork, however their schooling sessions include a lot of canter work and we also do interval training in the school (ours is big enough to do a decent XC canter down the long sides) - but that is mostly for their fitness and to make sure they have good wind, it doesn't have much influence on their mental state. During the winter when they don't compete and don't need to stay so fit, they could easily go a fortnight without a canter at all, but as long as they are still doing regular work of SOME kind, their behaviour remains pretty consistent.
 
Tobes is not particularly used to doing fast work on a daily basis, but I just find that before an event that is exciting - ie. a show, or a fun ride, having done a few fast rides makes him a lot easier. I guess he just gets it out of his system really, the need to go for a good gallop, and makes him less explosive, or tireder maybe!

We don't have an arena at my yard so doing an hour or so of schooling is not possible for us. He finds schooling tiring, so is generally better behaved even having done that!

Perhaps thats just him!
 
OBC thats interesting about Ginger, all of our ex racers have been fine with fun rides/hunting and treat them like exercise in a string, none of them have issues working with others in the warm up but current competition ones are entertaining. Kirkum gets bored easily unless everyone is obviously admiring him and invents his own entertainment, piaffe is not required in a Novice test nor is capriolle!! Fiddley starts bucking on the lorry the moment you drive near an XC course and although he has done BD areas and is capable of great scores tries to complete eventing tests as quickly as possible to do the more exiting bits!!
 
Two of the ex racers on our yard are tricky on fun rides and also hunting. Initially, OK, but after about the fourth or fifth time became quite explosive hunting.

I think with ex racers it all depends how long they have been racing as to how sane they are after. One of mine was in racing for 10 years - he was inevitably difficult as he had been so instituionalised. Those who have spend less time racing seem to be saner - but that is just my experience!
 
Fiddley was with Andrew Balding as a 2 -5 yo flat racer, he was a great racehorse and Andrew suggested we put him back into racing when we contacted him to tell him we had bought Fiddley. Kirkum came to us from a trainer friend of mine, although flat race bred he was so tricky he was not backed until after he was cut as a 4 yo. Everything he did on a racecourse indicates how he is now! His trainer told me that he usually slowed down at the grandstand to be admired and would just give up if the others went off too fast!! It was the same with others, it is not institutional it is more personality and training. Ginja Ninja was taken racing by someone known for hiring cheap young jockeys and essentially putting them on unbroken youngsters ( always mares) at the racecourse.

We believe the trainer they raced with is the most important indicator to their retraining, far more than breeding or anything else.
 
Ben doesn't know what fast work is! We went to a dressage show this weekend after him having a week off and he was perfectly behaved. I'm very lucky that his personality never changes - he always likes to go slowly!
 
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