Went to a clinic at the weekend titled as the above. Was very interesting, a few of your country men made the trip over, Steve O'grady and Mike Savoldi, a Canadian called Jeoff Thomson, and a few home grown ones, I'm not usually into these events but this was great.
What kinds of things did they discuss? O'Grady and Savoldi are great. Don't think I've ever seen Mr Thompson, but I don't get out much. Regards
Compared to Thomason, O'Grady and Savoldi are amateur scientists. http://www.ovc.uoguelph.ca/biom/faculty/jthomaso.shtml http://www.equineguelph.ca/research/researcher.php?profile=Thomason
Tom you are not wrong, all the speakers were excellent but I really enjoyed Jeoff Thomason. I believe he is off to your hoof care summit in Jan. Rick I will put up an itinerary later.
I saw Thomason's lecture at the IHCS a few years ago when he presented in vivo studies done on impact and loading using hoof mounted accelerometers. At one point in the study they detected some anomalies in the data, so they went out and tested the track surface. They found soft spots in the track surface in the places where the anomalies in the impact data occurred. That revelation made me wonder about some of the catastrophic breakdowns I've seen in race horses where a horse is galloping and all of a sudden the long bones of the limb shatter. What if they went and tested the section of the track where this happened? But then, I'm not the only one thinking this way because a lot of the funding for Thomason's research came from the Jockey Club. The objective was to find ways of reducing catastrophic track injuries. In the process of defining and hopefully solving this problem for the folks with the money to invest, we all get the benefit of a better knowledge base. And when it comes to credibility, this research beats the heck out of the reports of observations of feral herds.
I went to this lecture in New market Tom, page 13 and 14 touch on surface problems, there were a lot more problems discussed, I think the room full of eminent vets were against Gel Track surfaces. http://www.rossdales.com/downloads/nodg_report_march_12.pdf Also went to a lecture of Dr Sarah Hobbs on the effect of footing on hoof mechs. She also talked about abnormalities in the surfaces.
I imagine that hitting a soft spot in the track at a gallop is about like hitting a pot hole in the road when you can't see it coming. If they can see an impression or change in texture or color or elevation in the surface they are running on their brain will adjust their limbs to adapt to the changes in terrain. If they can't see anything but a consistent surface, then the only feedback they have is proprioception calculating the next foot fall based on feedback from the previous foot fall.
Years ago, I saw a Jockey Club movie - I believe titled "the blood horse" that would be great to see again somehow. Lot's of super slow-mo of racing TB's. I remember a sequence with horses on a sloppy track with closeup foot pics. High or hard spots in the base seemed the problem there. Feet would be sinking 3" into the slop, then suddenly hit a spot and only sink an inch. The jar was noticeable. Love to locate a copy of that. Not really surface related, but a second memorable sequence of that showed the match race between Secretariat and Riva Ridge as they came down the stretch. Their strides were perfectly synchronized but Secretariat's were a few inches longer. Small differences add up or as my Dad often said "there's a hellofa difference between a fast horse and a race horse". Not that those weren't both race horses.
I agree Jack, I used to look at horses trotting or just moving, you think you know whats happening then they invented high speed cameras and they showed you stuff that you could never of imagined.
Jack, I think they have a copy of that movie in the video collection at Kentucky Horseshoeing school.
