11/12/2025
Some food for thought.
We craft our clinic schedule incorporating this idea of seasonality and rest, along with our breeding and foaling schedules, to ensure both our horses and our own welfare. We are not robots and everyone needs rest!
What do you think?
Equestrian Sport has undergone a dramatic cultural and structural shift in the past few decades. Historically, the rhythm of horse competition followed the seasons: spring and summer shows, then autumn winding down, with the appearance of no-stirrup November focusing on the rider, and then winter serving as a natural rest period when horses and staff recovered.
Many breed-related disciplines still keep to this schedule, but why are we not seeing the continued trend in the hunter/jumper and dressage areas of sport? Remember, horses weren’t always these high-profile athletic machines that we see today. The show schedules used to mirror the agrarian roots of horsekeeping, when horses were part of a larger seasonal cycle of work and rest. So, where is the compromise between welfare and sport?
With the advent of year-round competition circuits—like the Winter Equestrian Festival in Florida or the Sunshine Tour in Europe—the old “off-season” has vanished. Prize money, sponsorship, and the prestige of continuous campaigning and chasing points and end-of-year awards have driven owners to keep horses in work far longer, and staff must adapt to an endless cycle of preparation, travel, and competition. Horses are noticeably tired, more injuries surface, and staff fluctuations are all a part of the larger picture in recent trends. The topic is certainly gaining traction in the show community, so let’s take a deeper look at what a rest and recovery period during the show year might look like.
Equine physiology is resilient but not inexhaustible. Like human athletes, horses need structured rest to prevent overuse injuries, including tendon strains, joint wear, and metabolic stress. Veterinary science suggests deliberate “down time” periods of at least 6–8 weeks annually, even if light hacking or turnout continues. In addition to routine veterinary visits, we can trust our close veterinary resources to help create individualized downtime.
Psychological rest–such as turnout, pasture time, and lower pressure work–is as important as physical. I used to follow the Pony Club handbook for conditioning and resting my horses, creating a weekly and monthly journal and calendar for each of my horses. Over the years, I started scheduling time for myself on a calendar, a novelty you might assume, but this sport is just as much mental discipline as physical discipline.
Staff, grooms, riders, and trainers face burnout when the calendar is relentless. Without a cultural shift in the sport, rest will not be prioritized. Unions in other industries have recognized the cost of fatigue on both performance and welfare—equine sport has yet to establish strong guardrails for well-being. I touched on thoughts of creating a union in previous articles. I cannot say it’s the perfect solution, but without regulation improving upon welfare as a new societal norm, reinforcing the principles is exponentially more difficult. If we cannot ethically police ourselves, our governing body must step up.
📎 Continue reading Katie Derer's article at https://www.theplaidhorse.com/2025/11/10/from-burnout-to-balance-protecting-horse-and-human-through-structured-rest/
