Too Early to Ride

There is NO reason to ever ride a horse for more than 5-10 minutes before it is a 3yo. By 3yo, I mean a horse who has been outside of its mother for 36 months . For those of you who don’t know, some registries give all horses of that breed another ”year” of age on January first. For example, a TB born in May of 2009 is officially a one-year-old on January 1, 2010. This means that the so-called two-year olds competing on the track could still be months away from actually having 2 years on the ground.

I have bolded that first statement for a reason. I would like to underline it about a hundred times. So many people train and compete horses who are still very much immature. Every time I hear ”the vet told me it was okay” I want to respond with “Well, of course – he knows he will get a lot more business from you down the road as your horse breaks down prematurely, too.” As a society, we have become enamored of instant gratification. This has moved into the horse world as well. We breed, raise, and train horses in the highest levels before they are physically or mentally ready to handle it. The earlier you train them and compete them, the earlier you can get your money out.

Disciplines that frequently ride horses as long yearlings are: racing, western pleasure, reining, and the TWH show horses. I’m sure there are other pockets of this behavior, but I have not had the (dis)pleasure of seeing it myself. The first three do so for “Futurities” – competitions that showcase 3 year olds. How do you get top performance out of a 3 year old? Start training it as a yearling.

Let’s look at how the Futurities started: Futurities started out as what it sounds like – a showcase of what young stock might be able to do in the FUTURE. A 3yo was not expected to be perfect or excel – a futurity would just showcase a nice prospect for future buyers/owners. The REAL training would happen after the horse had matured. Eventually, the Futurities became THE showing arena. These horses peak AT THREE, and then are retired to breed or sold off before the injuries induced by stress on an immature horse create serious problems. In show barns, it is not uncommon to see four-year olds receiving hock injections to keep them sound. WTF? Horses should not need help remaining sound until their teens at least!

By six, most show horses are retired. At six, trail horses are just hitting their stride. FEI will not allow any horse younger than six to compete in jumping. FEI champions are frequently in their teens. Why is that? They were not rushed into training, nor were they ridden in infancy.

This is one of those areas where greed overcomes intelligence. It is NEVER OKAY to ride a horse that young! I do not support Showing of 3yo’s, and I do not support racing. I do, however, enjoy competitions involving horses started intelligently – show jumping and dressage, among others.