I don't mean to offend either:) but I don't see it being any worse taking an out of condition horse on a lenghly pleasure ride and then having to bute to get him over his soreness, vs. getting him in good condition on his meds,and THEN take him off and putting the horse thru a test to see if he could be fine with no meds.
I'm was just suggesting differnt things to try.
Becky
Fair enough! If it was really important to me to do this competition, I'd give it a try. He'd be better of in better condition, certainly. It's worth considering whether he could be taken off the meds, I just talked to my vet when he was here about whether there was any health reason (digestive or liver side effects, etc) to see if he is fine without. He didn't name and health reason to not let him stay on them indefinately.
I think I'd be best off to lightly condition him and keep him on his meds and not try to change his regimen for the opportunity to compete in one weekend competition this year. If there were more local events, maybe I'd try harder. What I hope to do instead is just go on lots of nice rides this summer, and maybe I'll be able to compete in NATRC someday. There's still plenty of time even this year to change my mind about that.
BTW - I was not considering that to be an example of my good horsemanship, I Buted him because I thought he might have overdone. I believed during the course of the ride that we were doing too much, that it was more than we should do. I get so few opportunities to go these days, that I jump at any chance to go, when the smart thing would be to take things slower, both with ecurbh, and with Bay. As it turned out, it could be he's a lot more capable than I think he is. He did fine. But I buted him that night as a precaution, not because I think it's just as good as being in shape.