Juan Sanchez, head lad at Alice Haynes Racing talks us through how and why they weigh their horses. Juan tells Horse Weigh about the structure that they use and their approach to weighing pre/post racing.
He told us, ” We like to make sure every horse is weighed on a Monday for the older horses and a Tuesday for the 2 year olds.”
Alice Haynes Racing uses these weights to compare each horse from week to week, giving the horses that are a bit light extra feed and those a bit heavy less, monitoring their condition and performance. They use the weights to gauge the optimal performance weight for each horse,
“We had a filly yesterday, Unforgetable Belle, who won at Leciester for the Midlands Park owners, she weighed 339 kilos so that would be her winning weight. So for her next run we weigh her before to see where she is in comparison to where she needs to be, to be at the same weight and performance level as her winning one.”
The Horse Weigh team asked Juan, “Do you weigh pre and post racing?”
His reply was, “Yes, sometimes we weigh the horses afterwards but usually we weigh them on the Monday and Tuesday, if we noticed the horse didn’t run to his optimum level we will take the weight the next day to see how much they have lost. Or where they are standing in terms of their optimal fitness and performance.”
Check out the video from Juan.
