[albrookes]

All questions have now been put to Harry (hopefully squeezed yours in too GT).

As soon as the answers come back I’ll post them.

Cheers

[albrookes]

Last chance to put your questions to Harry.

[albrookes]

Harry,

A horse of Highclere’s who’s been talked about already as a decent prospect is Deny, a colt out of top-class filly Sulk – please tell us a little bit about him and when will he be out?

How many mares do you have at Highclere and who are some of the old names that are still breeding there?

I share one mare with them, a lovely daughter of King Mambo called Model Queen and she is the dam of Regal Parade who must have a great chance of winning his first Group 1 at Haydock on Saturday. She is also the dam of Hot Prospect who so nearly won the Group 3 at Windsor last weekend and who looks sure to make into a very smart four year old next year. The mare currently has a Dansili yearling colt heading to the Tattersall sales and there is a Cape Cross filly foal that we will keep to race and breed from.

Which young stallion’s offspring are you most looking forward to viewing/purchasing in the near future?

Many thanks,

[albrookes]

It’s great to pick Bill’s brains about what blogs/papers/books to read to gain greater knowledge on the subject.

He recommends a number of books on the left hand side of the page here:

http://horsetrainingscience.blogspot.com/

[albrookes]

Thanks for your questions guys. Bill’s extremely knowledgeable/helpful so it was good to put some informed Qs to him.

We did a little 5-To-Follow with Jeremy the other week (One Way Or Another was one of them!) and I did notice when browsing his website the quality of his set-up and his use of technology. I thought the tilting floor in one of the boxes was very intriguing.

[albrookes]

Many thanks to Bill for his detailed answers. I hope you all enjoyed it.

He has very kindly asked me to add the following:

Specifically:

Recommendation 2: Catastrophic Injuries
• Promotion of standardized pre-race exam protocol
1. Develop a standardized protocol and procedures for pre-race examinations

Recommendation 4: Education
• Develop continuing education programs for trainers

There exists a precedent for using a heart rate monitor in conjunction with equine racing. Many endurance races of 30 miles and over require the checking of an exercising horse’s heart rate during several checkpoints throughout the course. Should the heart rate fall outside of the normal ranges, the horse is disqualified from the competition and immediately examined by trained personnel.

Through the use of a heart rate monitor/GPS unit, one can outfit a horse in under 30seconds with the equipment required to measure and record equine heart rate, speed, and distance during any gallop, breeze, or race.

The resulting info serves much as an exercise stress test does in a human, observing and quantifying the horse’s heart rate response before, during, and after an exercise bout will indicate the presence of abnormalities. The equine heart is the best vital sign of lameness, illness, or injury – often weeks before any visual cues are apparent to the trainer.

For the derby length of 10 furlongs, I would recommend the following:

-Test to encompass 12s/furlong pace at 60-70% of race distance for these elite horses

-1.25 mile race requires 6 furlongs breeze in 1min12sec

-Taken and passed, no less than 3 days before race, no more than 10 – ideal would be 7 days out.

-Recovery heart rate must fall to 120bpm within 2 minutes, and 80bpm within 10 minutes of peak work speed. (2min period reflective of horse being cooled down properly, 10min period reflects fitness level/conditioning of horse for the effort.)

In my opinion we must strive to prove that a horse is conditioned appropriately for a 6 furlong effort the week before being asked to race 10 furlongs. Horses that have undiagnosed problems with bone remodeling, tendon or ligament stability, or systemic illness or infection will not pass such a test.

Continuing Education for Trainers

With my background in exercise physiology I can structure an education program for trainers counseling them on a variety of topics directly responsible for the health and well-being of their animals.

Some topics to include:

-Proper warm up prior to race to decrease chance of injury
-Minimum training threshold necessary to ensure appropriate fitness
-How to spot the signs of overtraining syndrome
-Use of correct nutrition/diet practices to ensure proper recovery from exercise
-Establishing baseline resting heart rate data for each horse as a vital sign

[albrookes]

Jan Vermeer put ME away in the English and Irish Derby’s!

[albrookes]

Welcome to The Racing Forum, Angrove. Great to have you here.

I enjoyed looking at your site/photos. Can’t wait to hear more of the horse.

[albrookes]

Apologies for the delay here guys. The questions have been put forward so as soon as I receive the answer, you will have them.

Our next Q&A is likely to be with Phil Smith so have your questions ready – and keep them clean.

[albrookes]

Cheers everyone. Thanks also to Mark Loveday for being so generous.

It’s a great bit of fun, and very reasonably priced (no, I’m not on commission). But very addicted so yeah Nathan, your other half is probably right to be relieved.

For those of you that won, already have the game, or fancy purchasing it, check out the forum on the Strategic Designs/Starters Orders 4 site for some tips. There are also a number of ‘packs’ that those forum users have created to give a more realistic feel to the game – a better race program, actual horse pictures and so on. They’re all very friendly so feel free to ask them to email you the folders, then you can just drop them into the mechanics of the game and you’re away.

Thanks again to everyone who entered and we’ll try and get something going for York. If anyone has any ideas as to comp ideas with a bit of a difference I’m all ears.

[albrookes]

Thanks to everyone who entered and well done to those who tipped loads of winner, notably Evens And Odds today.

Final finishing order:

WelshWizard1973 – 207.3pts
Burrough Hill Lad – 192.25
The Young Fella – 188.6

Nathan Hughes – 168.6
andrew_03 – 153.05
Cheltenham Specialist – 148.85
Kevcal – 146.8
wilsonl – 111.8
Thehorsesmouth – 110.55
Texfitz – 74.5
Deano H – 62
jibsa – 57
maxilon 5 – 56.75
Gerald – 25
aaronizneez – 19.75
wen64 – 2

The top 3 finishers all win a copy of the game. To claim your prize, private message either me or Cormack15 and we’ll organise for you to receive your game code via email. Simply download the game from startersorders.com, enter your code and you’re away.

[albrookes]

After Day 4

WelshWizard1973 – 173pts

The Young Fella – 158.5
Nathan Hughes – 151.3
andrew_03 – 137.75
Kevcal – 119.8
Burrough Hill Lad – 116.25
Cheltenham Specialist – 115.05

[albrookes]

Sorry jibsa – forgot to put your 11.75 points for Dance East on.
Cheltenham Specialist had a 10-1 winner (20pts) and Kinky Afro got him 11 for finishing 3rd.

[albrookes]

After Wednesday’s racing:

WelshWizard1973 – 136 pts

The Young Fella – 116
andrew_03 – 111.25
Nathan Hughes – 94
wilsonl – 88

Remember top 3 each win the game

[albrookes]

After Wednesday’s results:

WelshWizard1973 – 79pts

Wilsonl – 78
andrew_03 – 67.25
Nathan Hughes – 62.5
The Young Fella – 56.5
Chelt Specialist – 55.25

All to play for

[albrookes]

Thanks for the questions. They have all been forwarded to Bill.

[albrookes]

After Day 1

The Young Fella – 41pts

WelshWizard1973 – 36
Kevcal-34
Burrough Hill Lad – 33
andrew_03 – 31
Nathan Hughes – 28
wilsonl – 25.5
Jibsa – 19
aaronizneez – 17.5
Cheltenham Specialist – 15.5
thehorsesmouth – 11
Deano H – 10
Maxilon 5 – 4.5
Gerald – 4

[Author]

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