09/17/2026
For many riders, rehabilitation starts after something goes wrong. Dr. Julie Vargas, founder of Limestone Equine Performance Medicine in Lexington, Kentucky, would like riders to think about that timeline differently.
“Any horse that’s in competition should be in some phase of prehab,” Vargas said on The Plaidchat. After spending six and a half years overseeing Spy Coast Farm’s rehab and fitness center, Vargas has built much of her work around a simple idea: the tools we use to bring horses back from injury can also help prepare them for the demands of competition before an injury occurs.
Sport horses are asked to do a tremendous amount. They train consistently, travel frequently, compete on different surfaces, and may move from one show directly to the next. Vargas pointed out that many horses never experience a true season of rest. “The good ones can do that for a little while, but that catches up with everyone,” she said.
Vargas said many of the problems she treats develop through repeated, low-level stress over time. That stress may affect bone, joints, tendons, ligaments, or other soft tissue. Those cases can be especially challenging because the horse may also have developed compensatory or maladaptive movement patterns along the way.
Prehab is one way to think earlier. Rather than waiting for a lesion to appear and then beginning physical therapy, riders can incorporate appropriate movement, conditioning, and body-awareness exercises into a horse’s regular program.
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