How to break a world record?

[SweetP]

I was wondering how to break a world record? I read Frost's guide about competition but i just didn't find his instructions very clear, in my opinion. I also noticed there isn't a complete guide about it. Has nobody had the time to do it or haven't thought about it? Maybe there's another reason?

Well not excactly break, but atleast hold a world record?

Thank you for helping me out! Have a good day/night!

[EclipticEnd]

-

From my understanding Frost's guide is more of a horse guideline for breeding a horse that's well suited for a discipline. The height/build/size/type are parts of an evaluation and can be seen with any book. The numbers are conformation numbers that're possibly the minimum you want your horse to have in order to have a chance at breaking a record. You'll want to try to match your horse to one of the disciplines and then work on improving it within the suggested parameters.

Here's what I know as someone who hasn't done competitive RH breeding but has looked into it:

• Local shows can be used to test your horses in order to see if they have potential to break any records. Local show scores do not count for records, only scores placed within player-made competitions.
• There's ten levels of competitions in each discipline. I believe that you best time will only count for the level of competition that it's scored in, so if you know your horse has the ability to break a level 4 record and not a level 5, focus on entering the level 4 competitions only.
• To add on to that, h0rsey found that there's set ranges in each discipline in that a horse's best time is a set amount of seconds less than their worst time. I've linked their topic at the bottom of this reply. You can use this information to figure out your horse's potential.
• A horse does not necessarily have to have an amazing win percentage in order to break a record. The current level 10 Barrels RH has an 83% win rate. The current level 5 Dressage RH has a 63% rate. I assume that this is to do with the heart gene (in which the Dressage RH might have a lower heart gene and therefore not win as much) but I'm not 100% certain.
• Experienced players know what times/scores to look for in newborn foals who enter local shows. I assume that you learn this by testing a foal at newborn (maybe devote a turn's worth of time for this), noting the best time in the foal's description, training the foal and fixing weight and temperament, and then checking again at 5 years of age. I think there's also some tools made by players that can help with this.
• Weight and Temperament both impact competitive ability. Sometimes changing the horse's weight just slightly can make them preform better or worse. When you have a really good horse, it can be worth playing around with weight to see if you can get them to preform at their very best. Temperament is similar I think, but I don't know quite enough about this to offer information.
• Height also changes, but unlike the others it will eventually settle to a permanent number at 5 years of age. This is why some players wait until their horses are 5 years of age before culling/testing.
• I've heard that stallions will preform the best in shows, but mares will pass down better genetics.
• On the topic of genetics, the Breeder's report is innate talent and the Conformation is physical standards if that makes sense. I've read that a better BR/HGP is better than a higher Conformation; a low BR can't be carried by a high Conformation but a low Conformation can be carried by a high BR I think. When breeding your horses, focus primarily on getting a high BR/HGP before working on Conformation.
• Additionally the heart gene exists.

Basically, breed your horse to Frost's discipline guidelines (or close to them). Test your horse in local shows to find your horse's best/worst time range (check h0rsey's post for info on that). Enter the horse in the level of shows that they can break the record of. Enter them a lot. It can take a ton of tries for a horse to run their best possible time. Eventually they'll break that record if they have the ability to. Use that horse to breed higher quality foals if possible.

Again, I'm not a competitive breeder really so I haven't dived into this stuff too far, but I hope that's helpful nonetheless. If something's wrong then I hope that someone will correct me; I tried to stay away from detailing things that I'm not certain of.

Some players have made some helpful tools as well. I'll link them below if I can find some of them.

• Data Collection (Local Comp Testing) by Cypress Creek Elites
• Range by h0rsey
• Evaluating Stud Quality - A Guide to Picking the Right Stallion by Silverine
• All Breeders Report Comments by Totina

[SweetP]

-

Thank you so much! So if I understand correctly, these are the steps. I also have some questions along the way

Step One
Feed Horse 95% Yellow Corn

Step Two
Keep Horse In Barn

Step Three
Wait Till Horse Is 5 Years Old
At 5 Horses Stop Growing, There Are Now Zero Variables
IF
Horse Is Poor Weight(Lowest It Can Possibly Go)
Horse Is The Tallest It Will Ever Be (Done Growing)
Horse Is Completely High Strung (Temperament UnChanging)
ABSOLUTELY NO Training Prior To Testing
Question: No training?
Question: Is this what is supposed to happen at 5 years old?


Step Four
Enter Local Shows Level 10
Record Results
(Is this when they get a record? Only if they do)

Step Five
Record And Train Only The Best Scoring Horses (Test at least 10 Locals)

Step Six
Only Breed Top Scoring Horses
Mares Will NOT Score As Well As Stallions. Figure Out What Scores You Desire For Breeding Stock Yourself.

[EclipticEnd]

-

ABSOLUTELY NO Training Prior To Testing
Question: No training?
Question: Is this what is supposed to happen at 5 years old?

I believe so. The lack of changing variables means that you can accurately compare the horses to each other to see which have better scores. They'll all be at the lowest weight, highest temperament, and maximum potential height. Because weight and temperament will alter results, having them be at the same number (or as close to the same number as they can be) means that you're testing the horse's innate talent more than physical ability. Height also impacts performance, but theoretically your stock will all be around a similar height. With that being said, don't be afraid to experiment and fine-tune the height of your herd to get better results. Frost has some height recommendations but also has some disciplines where they're not completely certain about it.

Step Four
Enter Local Shows Level 10
Record Results
(Is this when they get a record? Only if they do)

You'll get records only in player made competitions. Local show testing is just to check how good the horse's potential scores are compared to the rest of the horses you're testing. At this stage you're probably putting the horse's best local show score in their description to compare to the others, which you do on your noted step 5.

Like you say, you'll be keeping and training only your best horses. The rest will be either sold or rehomed depending on how private you want to keep your lineage. Failed competitors often make decent grinders and sometimes good breeding stock for other breeders, so there's certainly a market for them if you wish to make them public.

It'll be up to you to decide how many foals you're keeping out of each group. I'd suggest keeping a higher number when you're just starting out and then slowly keeping less and less each generation as quality control until you're only keeping one or two (assuming that they out preform your current stallions or broodmares).

Also as you noted, mares don't tend to out-score stallions. You do want to keep some mares for breeding stock, but they likely won't be your RH competitors. I would almost say that it'd be worth comparing your prospect foals in two groups based on gender. That way you're figuring out your RH prospects (the colts) and your broodmare prospects (the fillies). Note that some generations might look better but may not produce foals that're as high of a quality as the previous generation. Don't necessarily replace a broodmare without checking whether or not the new one will produce foals up to your standard.

Training is kind of an optional step as you're starting out (in my opinion). Training makes it more likely that your horse will achieve their very best score and therefore is only really useful if you're intending on entering competitions. If you're not intending to do that yet (such as when you're just starting out your lineage) then it might not be worth training them. Make a note of their untrained times in their descriptions and you'll be able to compare the horses' foals to that time. That's just my take on it, though. If you want to train each generation then you certainly can, it'll just take longer to do.

Your last step after training will be entering comps. This is good to establish your line as you'll be showing how well they're performing based on wins per start; therefore, try entering horses even if they're not quite RH potential. If they are RH potential then this is how your horse has a chance to obtain a record. Local shows also don't tell you how much heart your herd has which is important in competing. Entering into player comps will give you a better idea about how fiery they are in performing. If you've trained a horse then you might as well title it, right?

Hope that helps! Let me know if you have more questions about this.

[SweetP]

-

Thats helps a lot! Haha i always thought horses got records from locals! This makes so much more sense now.

[SweetP]

-

I did have one more question: you said to make them the highest temperemant, High strung. But what if for example endurance, you need the temperment to be Bombproof? Can you change the temperment later?

[EclipticEnd]

-

I did have one more question: you said to make them the highest temperemant, High strung. But what if for example endurance, you need the temperment to be Bombproof? Can you change the temperment later?

I know that you can get horses to a point where the foals are born at Bombproof and never rise past Bombproof. You'd just want to get to that point and they won't rise even with all of the yellow corn. Alternatively I'd imagine you could just put them in a pasture with maybe weight gain feed instead of a barn/yellow corn combo and have them be Very Fat; it'd be the same as Very Thin except on the opposite end of the spectrum.

That'd be my best guess, anyway. I think it'd be better to source some stuck at Bombproof horses and do the barn/corn method but theoretically the pasture method would work as well.

[SweetP]

I did have one more question: you said to make them the highest temperemant, High strung. But what if for example endurance, you need the temperment to be Bombproof? Can you change the temperment later?

I know that you can get horses to a point where the foals are born at Bombproof and never rise past Bombproof. You'd just want to get to that point and they won't rise even with all of the yellow corn. Alternatively I'd imagine you could just put them in a pasture with maybe weight gain feed instead of a barn/yellow corn combo and have them be Very Fat; it'd be the same as Very Thin except on the opposite end of the spectrum.

That'd be my best guess, anyway. I think it'd be better to source some stuck at Bombproof horses and do the barn/corn method but theoretically the pasture method would work as well.

I think i'll try keeping them in the barn and see what happens If there temperment changes, if i put them in the pasture, will it change back to bomproof?

[EclipticEnd]

I know that you can get horses to a point where the foals are born at Bombproof and never rise past Bombproof. You'd just want to get to that point and they won't rise even with all of the yellow corn. Alternatively I'd imagine you could just put them in a pasture with maybe weight gain feed instead of a barn/yellow corn combo and have them be Very Fat; it'd be the same as Very Thin except on the opposite end of the spectrum.

That'd be my best guess, anyway. I think it'd be better to source some stuck at Bombproof horses and do the barn/corn method but theoretically the pasture method would work as well.

I think i'll try keeping them in the barn and see what happens If there temperment changes, if i put them in the pasture, will it change back to bomproof?

It depends on the horse. Sometimes they can get stuck at High Strung and sometimes they'll go back down to BP.

Thinking about it now, I'd suggest going for a feed mix of 40% alfalfa cubes and 55% weight gain mix. That should get them to 95% feed while prioritizing fiber over sugar. Fiber lowers temperament, so that should lower it while losing weight. You might have to mess with it a bit depending on your horses and how much they eat, but as long as fiber's higher than sugar it should be fine.

[SweetP]

I think i'll try keeping them in the barn and see what happens If there temperment changes, if i put them in the pasture, will it change back to bomproof?

It depends on the horse. Sometimes they can get stuck at High Strung and sometimes they'll go back down to BP.

Thinking about it now, I'd suggest going for a feed mix of 40% alfalfa cubes and 55% weight gain mix. That should get them to 95% feed while prioritizing fiber over sugar. Fiber lowers temperament, so that should lower it while losing weight. You might have to mess with it a bit depending on your horses and how much they eat, but as long as fiber's higher than sugar it should be fine.

Thanks! I do have a couple more questions tho:
- Is the range from the competitions or the locals?
- For the score, do you take the score without the penalties or the total with the penalities? To note the Best and Worst.