Re-inventing the Phebes: Part 3, A Training Plan

As mentioned somewhere in a previous post, we are starting over beginning next weekend, weather permitting. Phebes will have been on R&R a month. Nine-hundred-seventy miles later, she deserved and needed a rest. Not all conditioning will have been lost in a month. I will back up to a level that I feel is easy for her and we will build from that. Her training will broken into three sessions per week. We will train LSD on the weekend, and during the week we will address the other areas of training. I think I'll hang a clipboard in the barn to remind me to check her muscle tone, her weight, her appetite, and attitude. We will make adjustments for the needs of a distance horse vs. a racehorse. Interval training will be over a set course which at this time is undecided. Rides over 5 miles, on pavement, or gravel will be booted (Easyboot Glove). Workdays she will get a performance feed in addition to her low starch a.m. & p.m. meal. Her training will be comprised of progressive loading over three sessions covering three different goals, with rest periods in between. We will look into getting a good stop watch, and I will record her post-ride pulse, watching for blips on the radar. If weight drops, then she will have to put it back on before we proceed. We will continue to build structure, and stamina, and when all the gears are working, then we will develop speed. None of this information is new. What is new, is my way of looking at it, and how one thing relates to another. So this will be a season of re-inventing the Phebes. KYTITA! ~E.G.