Horseback racing

[Brian63]

This came up in a recent discussion. Anyone know the answers?

In horseback racing, do the horses themselves actually know and/or care that they are racing each other? Or are they just doing whatever their rider tells them to do?

Do they know whether they won or lost? Do they know the rules of the sport? Do they run with their own certain strategy in mind? Or again, do they just do whatever the rider instructs them to do (riders kick the horses in the side as a command to speed up, right?)?

Do the horses express different emotions based on whether they won or lost a race, or are they indifferent?

Thanks.

 

[TSwizzle]

Maybe this will help.

 

[Brian63]

I posted this elsewhere on the internet, and someone responded:

"From my experience - and people who are around horses 24-7 may have a different perspective on some things - horses know they're racing. They get keyed up when all the signals of race day are there. There is the instinct to stay with the pack but they do respond to jockey signals (clucking to them, urging them with their feet and hands, whip - less kicking per se since jockeys have just their toes in the stirrups, so they tend to use their legs more than feet to urge horses on). Racehorses have different running styles and it's up to the trainer to discover what those preferences are - running on the lead, coming from behind, sitting close to the leader - and getting the jockey to use that as a strategy to win. They seem to know if they win - they get more attention - but I'm not sure if they care if they lost. They have no concept of rules or strategies other than what's trained into them."