Quad X Equine Strength and Conditioning

Certified through The Animal Rehabilitation and Health Academy. This Academy provides high quality advanced professional development courses for veterinary nurses, canine therapists, equine therapists and coaches. These courses are focused around physiotherapy, rehabilitation and physical health for horses and dogs.
 The Quad X Equine Strength and Conditioning method provides correct strengthening to horses with targeted exercises to reduce injury and increase performance.

Now certified in Equine Strength and Conditioning, Kristi will be offering these services as part of her practice

New patient Assessment $50 (required)

*Exercise rehab programs are specific on injury and patients needs
*Strength and conditioning programs are determine on a case by case basis and charged weekly for program updates and check ups

What will they do?

The Strength and Conditioning exercises are relatively easy to carry out. Many people are now using them in rehabilitation or to help with balanced muscle growth, better proprioception and strength for their horses. But what is missing is a method which helps to make decisions about what exercises to use and how to progress them in a particular way for the individual, horse, and circumstance.

It is very important that the horse is evaluated along the way to identify their individual weakness and inaccuracies in their movement patterns.

When it comes to training movement, whether in daily schooling or after injury, there is no, “one size fits all” set of exercises. They need to be carried out under expert supervision so that they improve your horse and not worsen the condition. The Quad X method comprises a multitude of frameworks and tests so that your coach can guide your horse through his own strength progression journey.

Kristi is now a professional coach, and therapist who has trained in the Quad X method to provide tailored strength and conditioning programs for your horses.

Your Quad X Strength and Conditioning Coach will work with you to identify where your horse has areas of weakness and/or movement imbalances, and guide you through a tailored program which will help your horse develop in the correct way. This will not only improve their ability to carry you, their way of movement and performance — but will also reduce the chance of injury. Using a Quad X Strength and Conditioning Coach will help you develop a strong, flexible and happy horse.

By training balance, stability and flexibility, your horse is able to build on that foundation to increase strength and endurance, with correct posture, physiology and kinematics. Increasing power and strength from a correct mobility standpoint enhances performance in any equine discipline

Correct proprioception activates motor control and aids the body in correct placement of foot to ground response for correct joint placement without compensation. If we can target the brain and its responses through the 300 billion receptors in the horse's body, we can train the body to perform correctly. Therefore, providing the horse with a solid foundation, we can increase intensity during conditioning without fear of injury. From strong isometric contraction to increasing eccentric muscle contraction to then build faster concentric flexion contraction, we create a strength and conditioning program that enables your horse to exceed any level of discipline.

For this case study we chose Blue — a 22-year-old grade mare used at the Cathedral Home in Laramie, WY for therapeutic work with youth. Triggerpoint LLC had performed multiple therapy sessions on Blue previously, so we knew her condition, strength level, behavior, and issues. Blue was assessed by Kristi Coulthard for body work purposes. Each visit took between one and a half to two hours. With each session, we saw improvement — as long as there was consistency from both the therapist and the owner/barn manager.

The barn manager noted: 'Blue's back looks as if you could pour water on her back and it would hold it.' Blue suffered from severe anxiety that caused her to paw constantly when tied. She was buddy sour, could not stand square, rode with no collection, high head, was pushy, and would not back up with a hard hand — let alone soft encouragement. Due to poor hoof care, Blue had atrophied glutes and hypertrophied hamstrings, an extremely weak back, and favored her back left due to a possible stifle issue in the right stifle.

Strengthening and conditioning these joints to encourage certain tendencies allows larger movement and heavier load on the joint — making movement natural when reaching higher goals without injury. Correct proprioception activates motor control and aids the body in correct foot placement to ground response for correct joint placement without compensation.

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