Yesterday I discussed heart rate variability (HRV) as a measure of stress in both horses and their humans.
HRV is a useful measure of stress as it is unaffected by exercise - so, even if the horse is jogging about in front of the trailer, HRV will not be affected.
Heart rate goes up when a horse is stressed, anxious or exercising but HRV goes down. I know, weird, right?
What that means is that the heart rate gets more regular when you are stressed. If you've ever been really scared you'll know that feeling of your heart pounding in your chest - bang-bang-bang. When you're relaxed, so is your heart and there is some variation between the beats, they are not regular (bang - bang-bang - - bang).
Tomorrow I'm going to look at why it's so important that we measure these things and what it means to our training. In the meantime, pop along to the store (above) and sign up for the FREE tips and videos if you haven't already done so.
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