What to do in a vet gate

I’ve had quite a few requests over the years to do a video on what to do in a vet gate. Basically I haven’t been doing any vet gates until this year to film it, so now we’re back to doing them I thought it was time I put together a video showing what we do.

Now everyone does it slightly differently, horses and riders have different needs and how I do it might not necessarily work for anyone else. But my hope is that this will help for anyone doing their first vet gate and that you can go into it with an idea of how it could go and develop your own style from there.

I am extremely lucky to have crew so my routine and experience is from that perspective. It can be done without crew you just need to be a little more prepared and have your routine absolutely down.

This is my vet gate check list:

• Collect time card from timekeeper (this will show you when you arrived so you know when your time runs out to vet and you need to present it to the vet in the vet gate. Always keep it in the same place so you don’t lose it)
• Untack the bit and saddle
• Offer horse a drink (I do this before we start cooling as I don’t want to put them off drinking, the more experienced they get then you can start doing multiple things at once)
• Begin wash down (at the moment I know Estrid’s heart rate will be quite high so I don’t take the heart rate straight away, I wash her down to get the sweat and dirt off and then see how much more water we’ll need to cool her)
• Boots off and pick out feet (I do this before the heart rate as I can’t vet until it’s done so there’s no point checking if we can go in yet)
• Take heart rate (Above 70bpm and I continue to pour water, below 70bpm and dropping then I present to the vet as by the time we get there and stand still it’s usually dropped below 64. This is where a stethoscope can be super handy as it’s easier to tell if the heart rate is dropping, steady or a bit erratic but you can tell with a heart rate monitor too)
• If I’m ever unsure then I will walk a 20m circle and then take the heart rate again, if it’s shot up were not ready, if it’s remained the same or dropped we’re good to go.
• Present to the vet with your time card and remember you need to pick it back up as it will have your hold time and time out on it. (Always check it, everyone is only human and sometimes it might be incorrect so best to double check it).
• I then wrap Estrid up in rugs to keep her muscles warm during the hold, sometimes we may do a light massage if any areas are of concern but mostly we just let her walk, graze and eat from her buffet.
• We then set timers for 10minutes before our time out to start tacking up. (Tacking up takes me less than 5minutes which allows time for a hand walk to warm up again or a ridden warm up before we’re back out on course).
• Now is the time for rider toilet stops, if you don’t desperately need to pee at this point you’re probably not drinking enough on course.
• I have electrolytes and Y food in the vet gate, alongside a banana and flapjack if I want it. (Y food has 500cals and is a complete meal drink so I’m confident I’m fuelling well).
• I then check the next loop so I know what distance/colour/letters I’m going to next.
• When the timer goes off we start tacking up and head towards the timekeeper for a warm up.
• I always hand in my time card a couple of minutes before so they know I have arrived and am waiting to go back out.
• Just before we head out we’ll offer a last drink and do a quick slosh and off we go.

I’d love to know what other people routines and tips are and if you’ve yet to do a vet gate what are your thoughts?