Road to the Tevis Cup Post # 16: Fantazia is getting fat

According to the experts, horses that have been exposed to dangerous levels of smoke (AQI > 300) for extended periods should be allowed time to recover. (See my post on the topic: (Not) riding in smoke from wildfires.) Because we had AQIs over 500 for two weeks straight, our horses should have a minimum of two weeks of AQIs < 200 before returning to conditioning. Our first day below 200 was 11 days ago… Fantazia is getting fat!

In other words, one more week of no training for the Tevis Cup. No training at all, in fact. I take Fantazia out every 2-3 days to groom her and hand walk. We go down to the training barn, and then to the mailbox. It ends up being about 1.5 miles of walking. One day we walked four miles on the road. It was like leading a fire breathing dragon. Fantazia has an extremely loud snort and she loves to employ it.

Fantazia getting a bit fat is not a bad thing…

Given her history of being difficult to keep weight on, it’s far better to start with a bit of extra fat. Fantazia never overeats. If I give her 15 pounds of hay, she’ll leave 4-8 pounds, depending on her mood. When she’s anxious, she’ll eat maybe 5 pounds of hay. (See my post on Feeding the anxious horse.) Fortunately, she always eats her Ultium Gastric Care and rice bran.

Unfortunately, travel makes Fantazia nervous. Competing makes her nervous — not that I’ve been able to get to a ride yet, but I can tell from her demeanor when she sees other mounted horses. So it’s just as well to start a bit fat.

The trouble is fat also means out of shape

When I stopped conditioning, Fantazia was ready to do 12-15 miles at a good pace. Now we’ll have to backtrack a bit.

Returning to work

We’ll start in the arena, with a lot of walking. Because it will have only been two weeks, I don’t want Fantazia to use her lungs too much. We’ll walk for the first week. She will of course be ferocious and spooky. That will be worse in the arena, but if we go on the trail, it is really difficult to avoid steep hills. Steep hills make her lungs work more than I would like at first.

After a week, I’ll trot in the arena. We’ll head out the back gate into the hills, but I’ll avoid the steepest climbs.

I can’t wait!!