This really isn’t an answer that is black and white. There are several factors that go into it, such as breed, age, and riding goals.

For example: If your goal is to produce an athlete from your horse. You are most certainly going to want to treat your horse’s body the way you would be treating your body. It’s not just about the number of days that you work, but also about the nutrition and the feed quality. You would be working towards the perfect balance of building muscle, teaching your horse something new, creating consistency throughout each ride. 

Another factor is breed and age of the horse. For example: If you have a 3 year old Quarter Horse vs a 3 yr old warmblood who is more underdeveloped both mentally and physically, who would choose to to limit the number of rides per week over the slightly more mentally developed Quarter Horse.

While there is no exact answer of how many times you work your horse, you want to think quality sessions over quantity sessions. If you start having more quality out of each session, meaning that you are going through a training process that works first through helping the horse create mental relaxation, then helping their body to properly build muscle,  you are going to start seeing results. You have to utilize the window of opportunity and determine what your overall goal is to start creating that plan throughout each session. 

I know there are so many opinions out there with how many days a week you need to ride, how hard you need to ride, but the reality is every horse and every rider are different. First, determine your goals, and from there, you can start developing a plan and seeing what schedule works best for both you and your horse. 

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With all this being said, we want to hear from you! Let us know below what your goals are and how often you work your horse!