This ground-breaking book explores the issues surrounding barefoot horses in the UK and looks in detail at how to improve overall hoof health, in both shod and barefoot horses. This new edition in paperback offers practical, hands-on advice on achieving barefoot performance in a variety of disciplines - from eventing and hunting to endurance - focussing on the essential elements for healthy hooves: diet, environment, exercise and trimming or shoeing. In addition, the book has step-by step advice on rehabilitating problem hooves with case studies of horses with a range of issues, from navicular or tendon damage to metabolic disorders like laminitis and insulin resistance. The authors have successfully ridden and competed their own horses barefoot for many years and have helped many hundreds of their clients' horses work successfully without shoes.

Many horses will, at some point during their lives, suffer hoof problems which, in extreme cases, can cause permanent lameness. So why should outstandingly healthy, hardworking feet be a relative rarity? Performance Hoof, Performance Horse explores the idea that, given the right conditions, healthy hooves are not difficult to maintain and neither do they need much in the way of human intervention, and that the unshod or 'barefoot' horse can be tough, strong and sure-footed. The book offers practical advice on how best to work with a horse with compromised feet in terms of nutrition, surfaces and exercise in order to restore its hooves to optimum condition. Topics covered include: assessing hooves and hoof balance; the pros and cons of trimming; fixing problem feet and, finally, developing stronger hooves.