* Training happens once a week for each stable - either Monday (Class 1-3) or Friday (Class 4-6).
(See Daily/Weekly timetable).
* The next available training session for your stable is shown on the '
Facilities and Training' page
To train a horse, first you must have Training capacity available. You can do this by hiring a trainer (an hour at a time) to come and work with your stable on the 'Stable facilities and training' page. Any training hours that you do not use during the week may potentially be sold on (possibly at a profit!) to the public, with the amount of hours that can be sold depending on the number of Administrative assistants you have employed. (See Administrative assistants)
Once you have training capacity to suit your needs, you can begin to Schedule the training of your horse. Pick a training type for any horses that you want to train, assign a trainer for however many hours that you require, and then apply the training. If this has been successful, a confirmation message will be displayed to tell you when the training will take place, and the training will be entered into the horses' Upcoming Schedule. Your horse will continue with this training program each week until you change it, unless your horse misses a training session due to a Schedule conflict. Of course, the horse will be busy training from the start of training time, for however many hours you have asked it to train. Make sure that training doesn't interfere with any other commitments!
Your trainer/s flatly refuses to travel - probably because of how difficult it is to move the training equipment from one location to another?! Whatever the reason, for a training session to happen your horse will need to be located at your stable at the appointed training time. You can double check that everything is OK by looking at the Upcoming Schedule for that horse. Schedule conflicts will be highlighted so you shouldn't miss any that may appear.
Different training activities will have different outcomes for your horse, but one thing is for certain - it takes time and effort to see the changes in your horse. Practice makes perfect! The results of your training will be seen each week at the designated Training Time for your race Class (see Daily/Weekly Schedule). Training rises are shown in blue, and training drops are shown in red.
Trainers often have more trouble training highly skilled horses, so it will take more time with the trainer to see the results of training on your champion thoroughbred than it will with your young unskilled prodigy. No matter the skill of the horse, the longer the horse spends training, the more the horse loses interest. Short sharp training sessions are more effective (hour for hour) than long drawn out sessions... and there's an upper limit of 12 hours training per week on any individual horse. Some training types are also affected by various Specialist Facilities - some for better and some for worse! (See Specialist Facilities)
Training Types
Each type of Training has it's advantages and disadvantages - you need to decide how to shape your horses abilities.
Following is a quick description of the training types available, and how they affect your horse:
- Beach gallops - A refreshing gallop for the horse on the sand, helps stamina and heart and works off a few pounds too!
- Beach walks - A relaxing walk along the seaside. Sea air is good for the soul and condition, but it's not really good for the muscles?
- Conditioning - A medium workout used to 'harden' a horse. Good for stamina and putting on some muscle weight, and being a medium workout it doesn't take too much out of the horse.
- Cross country - Some good positive exercise that builds body stats, although it's fairly taxing. Horses take small steps going over obstacles though...
- Pampering - Sometimes, you just wanna spoil your horse! Massively good for recuperation, but not really the sort of training a true champion needs!
- Short sprints - A medium workout that is aimed at helping your horse reach its maximum speed as quickly as possible
- Starting stalls - A whole load of work in the gates might help your horse to explode from the gates. All this standing waiting for the bell is taxing for the heart though!
- Swimming - A really heavy workout that will really get the blood rushing and the muscles aching. It takes a lot out of the horse though
- Time trials - This gives the horse practice over race distance. It's tiring, but it certainly helps them learn how to handle a race of that length.
- Trackwork - distance - A long run on the track. Not as tiring as swimming but not as effective either.
- Trackwork - speed - Some time spent at the track focussing on maximising a horses top speed.
- Walking trail - Time to have a day out with the horse. Has restorative effects for the horse, and some minor impacts on physical stats.
