Good Vibrations?

Early-season roadwork can build bone strength and develop muscular and cardiovascular fitness, but the concussive forces created can be damaging. Dr David Marlin outlines the risks.

- David Marlin

As the competition season approaches, it is common to see horses being exercised on the road. Many riders use roads for early fittening work because they are flat, even and convenient. Not having horses covered from head to toe in mud every time they go out is a bonus.

Horses are less likely to lose shoes on the road than in heavy soil. Boggy going also heightens the risk of soft tissue strain in horses recovering from, or with a history of, this type of injury. Another consideration is that most (but not all) horses may be more settled and easier to keep under control on a road, compared with exercising around the edge of a field or on a long, open track in the early stages of pre-season training.

Pros and cons

So what are the effects of roadwork? Time off over winter will result in some loss of bone strength. Walking and trotting on roads is ideal for stimulating an increase in bone strength, due to the vibrations induced from the road. The periods of trot required are surprisingly short, however: about five minutes per training session.

The traditional view is that roadwork is good for “hardening” tendons. Research within the past 10 years by groups at the Royal Veterinary College (RVC) and Massey University in New Zealand, to name but two, shows that this view is probably wrong.

According to studies, tendon function can be beneficially influenced by exercise, but only in young horses less than two or three years of age.

Professor Roger Smith believes that while it is common practice to trot horses on hard surfaces such as roads to “firm up” their tendons, evidence from research until now has not been able to show this.