Could this ground-breaking piece of kit revolutionise the horse world?

One of the inevitable downsides of horse ownership is the ailments, niggles and injuries that crop up. So wouldn’t it be fantastic if you could help resolve minor issues in your horse’s body before they showed up in the form of lameness or below-par performance?

The Equusir BEST-Box is designed to do just that and a couple of yards in the UK are already seeing the benefits as it begins to cause a real stir within the racing industry and the wider equestrian world.

One such establishment is Dan Skelton’s Warwickshire racing yard, which has been using “the magic box”, as they call it, for the past year. It was Dan’s double Olympic gold medal-winning father Nick Skelton, who came across the kit while at a showjumping competition in Vienna, Austria.

“It was something I’d never seen before so I enquired about it and they gave us a demonstration,” Nick explains of the Equusir BEST-Box. “I asked if it was possible to get one in England and they sent it over.”

BEST stands for Bio Energetic Scan and Treatment and the German-designed machine scans each horse using “bioenergetic measurements” to identify any “blockages” in its body – from inflammations to digestive problems and deficiencies in hoof quality and coat – and then it applies infrared and coloured light to the relevant areas.

“We like it a lot – it helps us think outside the box,” says Dan, who trains around 100 National Hunt racehorses from his base. “We use it all the time; it’s become part of every horse’s routine now.”

According to Equusir, the Equusir BEST-Box helps to “maintain physical health in the long term while continuously increasing athletic performance” through a cycle of scans and applications. The company recommends these applications should be performed on three consecutive days, followed by a one-day break, followed by three more days with one application each.

During the colour light and infrared applications “the body’s own systems of the horse are supplied with additional energy. This causes, inter alia, the formation of new capillaries, stimulates the production of collagen and releases the main energy carrier of the cells (adenosine triphosphate)” says Equusir. The result is said to be a horse that is “more relaxed and ready to perform”.

“We use it on the showjumping horses, too, when they’re in England,” adds Nick. “But Dan swears by it. It shows up any little problems and niggles – it’s all logged on the computer.”

Obviously significant issues need to be diagnosed and treated by a vet, but this kit certainly looks to be playing a big role the day-to-day management of some of our leading equine athletes.

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