Unusual Horse Behavior

Question
I have a 5 year old in harness racing that's getting hard to control lately. He just wants to take off during training, jogging as well as before a race. The driver gets on him & he's fine until the horse gets up on the track and he just wants to go to the point the driver is laying all the way back to try to hold him! The "security" rider actually has to hold the horse until its time for the horses to line up at the gate. We think it could be the hocks?? He also just had a rock blow out about two weeks ago which our vet said he must have got it about 8 months ago and we've had him roughly since January. What else could this be & what can we use or do to help us have better control when training, as well as help out the driver!! Thank you

Answer
I am not a standardbred trainer but it sounds to me like your horse might be hurting somewhere.   Maybe start with a standard soundness check at the vet, blocking the horse from the ground up, until you find the source of pain.  A heart rate monitor will tell you if your horse is in pain because  heartrates that skyrocket quickly as soon as a horse trots off indicates pain.

Horses break gait, start doing odd behavior, running away, rearing..silly things like that, usually 9 times our of 10, it is due to undiagnosed pain somewhere.

Tom Ivers is an author that wrote a series of books in the 1990's about training both TB and StdB.  The Fit Racehorse is one title, another title was Racehorse Owners Survival Manual. If you can find a copy of one or both of those books, they would be wise investments.

I hope that helps.  

Thanks and best of luck to you.

Maureen Millen