by Jeff Lowe
Feeding a racehorse : It’s all about energy. These are athletes in high-level training. The goal is to get them to an ideal body condition for training and racing while giving them enough fuel for them to perform in the morning and in the afternoon.
Like an Olympic athlete, say a Michael Phelps who famously required 12,000 calories a day at the peak of his training regimen, racehorses need a lot of fuel–around 35,000 calories a day, which is roughly twice as much as a regular horse in a pasture.
The typical diet comes in two or three meals a day. In America, that mostly means grain. The traditional grain for horses is oats, and a lot of trainers today use commercial products that are specifically formulated for racehorses and mix in non-saturated fats and fiber.
Racehorses eat oats from our northern states and Canada, blended commercially and sold by a local supplier, also known as the feed man.
Most barns will have a night watchman feed the horses early in the morning (3 or 4 a.m.) so that they will have time to eat before training begins. Usually they will have another meal around 10 or 11 a.m., and then a larger meal around 4 or 5 p.m.
Trainers often have to worry more about their horses not eating enough, rather than too much.
West Point trainer Cherie DeVaux is very focused on her feeding plan. She relies on a specialized racehorse feed from Hallway that is designed to include enough protein, vitamins and minerals for a horse in training.
Cherie said, “Back in the old days they used to put a lot of additives in the feed but that can be hard on their kidneys and liver, to filter out what they don’t need. We top-dress with a higher-fat supplement from the same company to help keep their condition. In the winter especially, it helps keep their coats nice and bright.
“If we have a horse, often it’s a filly, who isn’t eating well, we’ll try to get to the root cause. It can be hind-gut ulcers, and there are medications for that, and we’ll also feed them smaller portions, more times throughout the day. It will be the same amount of feed in total, but a little different variety. There’s an equine senior feed we use that has a lot of fats and oils to help them.”
Racehorses also receive hay that they can consume at their choice 24 hours a day, often in a hay net hung next to the stall. Most hay at the racetrack is timothy, which is grown in the Northwest. Often a flake or two of good quality alfalfa hay is also added daily to the hay net. Having this hay constantly available to eat at will is very important because the horse’s digestive tract is designed for grazing many hours per day.
Around the world, racehorses are fed dramatically different diets depending on the feeds available. Fresh cut green alfalfa is common in Argentina. In Australia, they use minimal grain but a lot of wheat and oat chaff. In Saudi Arabia, fresh cilantro, carrots, and a big tub of barley is the standard diet.
Now what about treats?
Since getting enough nutrition and energy is so vital, trainers will try just about anything to encourage a horse to eat.
Guinness beer is the drink of choice for many racehorses in Europe and occasionally some here in the U.S.: a frothy Guinness stout will be added on top of the usual feed. Zenyatta famously received a Guinness everyday.
Some trainers will add perks like sweet potatoes or even raw eggs: the great sire Tapit received three eggs every day during his racing career, along with a Guinness. You will see some trainers put carrots in their horses’ feedtub to encourage them to chow down.
In the mid-1980s, Groovy was a champion sprinter even though he had an acute fondness for baked goods, specifically donuts with raspberry filling. He would whinny and nicker whenever a coffee wagon pulled up to the barn. When he went to stud at what is now WinStar Farm, the donuts went with him.
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Dripping Gold caught stealing from his neighbor’s haynet at Payson Park.
