By Gemma Redrup - also available in the August 2026 Issue of the BE Magazine

“My main point is to maintain a routine. You don’t want to change anything drastically in the lead-up to a competition, during it or afterwards. Horses are creatures of habit, and the closer you can keep everything to their normal routine, the less stressful it is for them.

“The biggest thing is knowing your horse inside out. Know how much they normally drink in a day, whether they’ll drink from one bucket but not another, whether they dunk their hay, or how much forage they usually leave. If you’re staying away, get to know what the stable normally looks like when you muck out in the morning. Those little details can tell you an awful lot.

“It’s often the smallest changes that are the first sign that something isn’t quite right. If you know what’s normal for your horse, you’ll spot those changes much sooner before they become a bigger problem.

“There are the obvious things we all do after cross-country, like cooling them properly, icing where needed, giving them time to recover, a quieter day after their run and trotting them up to make sure they’re sound. But for me, it all comes back to knowing your horse as an individual and keeping life as normal as possible. A calm, familiar routine creates a much less stressful environment, and that’s one of the best things you can do for their welfare.”

“The main things we work to at a competition are quite simple. Number one is making sure the horses are offered water continuously. Number two is keeping them out of direct sunlight whenever we can. And number three is making sure there’s always a good flow of air through the lorry. We’re lucky enough to have fans fitted, but we also open every window and every door so there’s always a breeze going through.

“When we’re competing, I try to keep the warm-up to a minimum. You obviously want the horse to be properly prepared and able to perform well, but you don’t want to overdo it or waste energy before they’ve even started.

“Recovery is just as important. We keep offering plenty of water to drink and use a constant flow of cold water over the horse after cross-country.

"There's been a lot of research into cooling horses after exercise, and we use the ‘no scraping’ approach, so we keep applying cold water and let it evaporate naturally rather than scraping it off between applications. It’s a simple but very effective way of helping horses cool down after a hard effort.”

Philip Surl, British Eventing technical advisor

“Horse welfare starts long before the first competitor leaves the start box. The obvious things are that courses, fence dimensions and fence types are all checked to make sure they meet the rules, but they also have to be appropriate for the terrain and the level of competition.

“Ground preparation has become one of the biggest welfare challenges, particularly during prolonged dry weather. British Eventing owns specialist ground-care machinery that can improve the going to an acceptable standard, even in difficult conditions, although it’s very much a firefighting measure. Ideally, once the ground has been aerated, it needs rain or irrigation to get the full benefit.

“Where organisers are able to water, it makes a huge difference, but people often underestimate what’s involved. It’s not a case of putting a little water on the surface – it takes an enormous volume of water, a lot of machinery and many hours of work, often through the night, to have a meaningful impact on the going.

“Welfare doesn’t stop with the course itself. Warm-up arenas and collecting areas are just as important, and we’ve seen many organisers invest in better wash-down facilities, ice, large water tanks and mobile water supplies around the course. If a horse is delayed or stopped for any reason, the priority is getting water to it as quickly as possible. It really is a multi-layered approach, with everyone working together to put horse welfare first.”