Our Facilities

GALLOPS

Six Furlong Woodchip All Weather Gallop

Beginning with a gradual incline, becoming slightly more challenging after a couple of furlongs and then gradually levelling off. Our gallop is perfect for building the horses stamina whether flat or national hunt horse. The woodchip is maintained daily to ensure the ground is level before cantering. We find the woodchip a great option as there’s plenty give.

Two Furlong Deep Sand Round Gallop

The deep sand gallop was constructed in 2020 and has become an invaluable tool for the early fitness work when horses initially return into training. They are able to build stamina and endurance with plenty of slow steady canter work on this deep sand surface.

SCHOOLING AREAS

Schooling Grounds

We have a variety of schooling hurdles and fences on both grass and all-weather surfaces. We ensure that our horses are schooled on a weekly basis by our regular jockey to allow them to develop confidence when negotiating obstacles. Also, the horses use different muscles when jumping compared to galloping, so we feel it’s important to allow them to use their bodies over hurdles and/or fences regularly to ensure the muscle memory is also trained and maintained.

In addition, we have a selection of logs, tyres, barrels, an open ditch running alongside the gallops to include variety and gain experience before running. We also use our show jumps in the outdoor school, this is a handy tool for teaching the babies how to jump. 

Three Bay Starting Stalls

This is a brilliant tool to give our youngsters some experience, we have it in the middle of our round gallop on a flat surface to ensure the youngsters the best chance to learn. We also take all our un-raced flat horses for a pre-race stalls test which is carried out ahead of racing on a race day. This doubles up as not only a test to ensure they are sufficiently trained for the starting stalls but also an opportunity to introduce the young horses to the hustle and bustle of the racecourse.

Outdoor School 70ft x 50ft 

We have a large school which has a mixed surface of sand and carpet. It’s the ideal place for the horses to be warmed up and assessed by Alastair before heading off up to the gallops. Due to its significant size and propensity not to freeze, it also acts as an alternative schooling area when the ground is frozen in winter. We use the school regularly with the youngsters, this is a safe environment where we can put poles out to give them extra education.

Lunge/Breaking Pen

With a carpet surface and high blocked walls, this is the ideal place for us to break the youngsters in and get them balanced on both reins. We also use the lunge pen for the horses needing some extra work to build their muscles up, using a lunging aid such as a pessoa is a great way to build up the muscle without any weight on their backs.

STABLES

50 Stables 

We have stabling for 50 horses, the majorit of which are in a large well ventilated American style barn with custom made toughened plastic stables amenable to high levels of cleaning and disinfection. All stables benefit from rubber matting at the front of the boxes and are bedded up with high quality dust free shavings. We do not use automatic water drinkers as we prefer to be able to monitor exactly how much each horse drinks.

OPEN FIELDS

Fields

We have access to over 300 acres of grassland; this is spread across our main yard and our second farm only 30 minutes away. The farm has 4 large fields where our horses go for their holidays and enjoy turn out in small single sex groups. 

At the yard we have smaller individual turnout paddocks that we use daily providing that the weather allows.

This also gives all the horses time out of their stables to relax and unwind after galloping or schooling.