Cardiovascular fitness an adult horse weighing in at about 1000 pounds contains more than 13 gallons of blood that is circulating through its body this moving blood has a couple of prime jobs to understanding fitness the horse fitness is the most important element of an event horses career. A horses general health needs to be checked before any fitness work begins if you are starting from scratch so make sure your horse is ready to start work by organising any vaccinations . For many horses this would not be the end of the program but just the beginning however for some this would be too aggressive and they would need to go even slower a good way to monitor your horses fitness level is by learning to take his pulse then you can make notes of his heart rate before and after your workouts after working a horses heart rate should return to normal within 15 minutes. The words equine fitness hold different meanings for various horse owners and riders a horses ideal fitness level depends on his workload and training schedule all horses should generally be in average physical shape and maintain a median body condition score however many factors contribute to overall fitness to understand the . Just like humans horses need to work on their fitness if they want to be athletic and perform well whether youre stepping up a level want to keep an older horse sound and fit or would just like to be able to ride your horse for longer before the sweating and heavy breathing kicks in a proper fitness regime is key to building up cardiovascular and muscular strength