Monday, May 24, 2010

BALLYDOYLE











Nijinsky  stands by the main gate





One of the main yards....This one houses the Older horses...................600 acres and every inch immaculate







Age Of Aquarius
As to be expected the stables are large.....and the Beds deep and comfy


Each horse has its own personal set of tack......kept in its own tack room.....lol......looks like this horse takes size five in wellies
Each Stable has a back door that leads to its own private paddock





Rip Van Winkle
This is a lovely gallop with a good pull to the top of a hill
most gallops have viewing towers.....you can see one in the trees there.

I lost count of how many gallops.....they are extensive
A fibre sand gallop......alongside runs a grass gallop


one of the many washing down bays..............horses are cleaned off after a gallop and then led back to there yards





one of the Two Year Old yards



Here's a resident......sadly all the group horses were under lock and key.




Covered walk





This is one of two new Chip gallops..........i was very impressed with these...........lovely surface
When Ive ridden on the fibre sand Ive always found them very heavy.......This gallop felt like you could get a good piece of work out of a horse
During the winter Flat horses are only ever ridden on the All Weather surfaces.   From my own experience you can find that the first time a horse is worked on Grass he can turn into a different horse and you can change your mind about his abilities.

Aidan O'Brien is a trainer who times his horses to be right for the mid summer so expect big improvements in the coming weeks,,...........many horses you are seeing have only had two or three grass gallops........They are there to improve!!



The roads alongside the gallops allow the trainer to watch at close hand how a horse is working



There are numerous sand schools for exercising and at lease four indoor schools as well . 












This horse walk runs alongside one of the gallops.....nice to be screened from the gallop so they don't try to join in!

There are over 100 small paddocks for turning out the runners for a spell every day




Swimming pool is as good as Ive seen..............good long straight or turn into the circle for a few laps



Hers where they enter the straight....or leave

and of course as you'd expect after a swim theres a "hot Box" or a Solarium to dry off under

Theres also Two Jacuzzi type baths..........horse walks in.......the doors are shut and the water fills from underground




Jacuzzi



Hotbox

Solarium





This beauty is a treadmill that allows horse coming back from injury to gallop under controlled conditions
A fresh horse that's been off work will often not go the required speed............to put it plainly either just "piss off " with its rider or try to fight the rider thereby throwing itself unbalanced.   This machine takes that fear away .......it goes the speed its asked!!

So you can see there is extensive backup for rehabilitationof  injured horses








the latest indoor school is amazing

That will give you a rough Idea of what its like behind those gates............theres much more!!