The benefits of strength training in human endurance athletes is now widely reported. The research is clear that strength training has a positive impact on endurance exercise performance in terms of maximal power, exercise efficiency, improvement in lactate threshold and importantly in injury prevention. It is a common error for endurance riders to ignore the importance of strength and power for performance, particularly with the idea that bigger muscles are not relevant to the type of work we ask of our endurance horses. However, it is not about gaining bulk, it is about increasing the strength of the individual muscle fibres (making each contraction more forceful), enhancing fatigue resist
After Saturday’s fabulous dressage day I did have high hopes for Chip’s behaviour at Tilford as we scored our highest percentage yet and he was so calm and relaxed in the warm up which is a big improvement from the stress head that he was in October in the warm ups. I collected the lorry from Equi-hire on Saturday night and packed up ready for our early start on Sunday morning. I wanted to make sure we arrived in plenty of time so that Chip could be walked around and warmed up before going into vetting at 8.15. Kate walked Chip around whilst I checked in and Pheobe and Cam got the kit out all organised ready to go. Kate and I went to pre-ride vetting and Chip was so immensely calm, even with
