Interval hypoxic training · Veterinarian-led
We bring the equipment to your yard. Your horse breathes thinned air through a soft mask, in his own box, at rest. The body adapts as it would at altitude — more oxygen-carrying capacity, better lactate clearance, a stronger aerobic engine — with no load on tendon, joint or bone.
The method
Interval Hypoxic Training alternates low-oxygen air with normal or oxygen-enriched air in controlled cycles. The horse stands still throughout. The stimulus is entirely physiological — nothing is asked of the musculoskeletal system.
9–16%
Hypoxia
Thinned air, equivalent to roughly 2,000–4,500 metres of altitude. The controlled shortage that triggers adaptation.
21%
Normoxia
Ordinary stable air, used as the recovery phase between intervals — and for horses in whom enriched oxygen is not indicated.
up to 33%
Hyperoxia
Oxygen-enriched air, restoring saturation quickly between intervals so the whole session is tolerated at rest.
How the hypoxic depth progresses
Hypoxic depth is never fixed. It descends step by step as the horse adapts — the chart below plots our own controlled 14-day study, from roughly 2,000 metres at the start to 4,000 by the end. Your horse’s programme follows the same principle, set to his own response. Drag across to follow it.
Controlled 14-day study
Equivalent altitude is computed from the inspired oxygen fraction using the international standard atmosphere.
What the research reports
The figures below come from one randomised crossover study in Thoroughbreds, linked in full further down. We would rather you read it than take our word for it, and we make no promise about what any individual horse will do.
28.4%
Run time increase
Run time to exhaustion, against 10.4% for the identical training in normal air.
12.1%
VO₂max
Maximal oxygen consumption, the standard measure of aerobic capacity — against 2.6% in normoxia.
11.3%
Cardiac output
Against a 1.7% fall in the normoxic group. Stroke volume at exhaustion rose 5.4%, where normoxia lost 5.5%.
Read that study carefully and one thing stands out. Those gains were produced by high-intensity exercise performed in thinned air — eight untrained Thoroughbreds cantering and galloping on a treadmill at 15% inspired oxygen, three days a week for four weeks. They are not evidence for breathing thin air at rest.
We are straightforward about this: the published equine performance data comes from exercise under hypoxia, while the programme we run applies the same gas principle at rest. That is why we measure your horse rather than promising him the numbers above.
In our own 14-day programme, simulating altitudes of 2,000–4,000 metres at inspired oxygen fractions between 16% and 12%, every test horse showed significant reductions in resting heart and respiratory rates, and measurable gains in performance readiness.
We recommend phased cycles of interval hypoxic training combined with tailored nutrition and recovery planning — not the training in isolation.
What changes inside
Controlled hypoxia activates HIF-1α — hypoxia-inducible factor — which regulates over a hundred genes associated with endurance adaptation.
Who it suits
01 · Performance
For building aerobic capacity without adding to an already full workload. Note that the published study was run in untrained Thoroughbreds, so the gains it reports should not simply be assumed in a horse already at peak fitness. Particularly relevant to endurance and flat yards, where the aerobic ceiling is the limiting factor and the training calendar has no spare weeks in it.
02 · Rehabilitation
This is the case that has no real substitute. A horse recovering from injury loses cardiovascular fitness while the tendon or bone heals. Interval hypoxic training delivers a genuine cardiovascular stimulus with no mechanical load at all — fitness maintained through the months when the horse cannot work.
The literature
Honestly
Response varies, and some horses are poor responders — the study authors note that the severity of hypoxaemia may simply be too stressful for those horses. Protocols are adjusted individually, and where a horse is not responding we will tell you rather than sell you another block of sessions.
Depth of hypoxaemia is monitored throughout every session to avoid excessive physiological stress, and every horse is assessed by a veterinarian before the programme begins.
Optimal protocols for each discipline are still under investigation. We follow the published work and our own measurements, and we will say which is which.
Programmes
Fifteen sessions across roughly five weeks, delivered at your yard — we bring the equipment to the horse, always. For yards outside the UAE, see international programmes. Every programme begins with a veterinary assessment, and the hypoxic depth is then stepped up session by session against that horse’s own response.
Mountain & Spa
AED 45,000 · 15 sessions
AED 3,000 a session.
Training & Treatment
AED 75,000 · 15 sessions
AED 5,000 a session.
How we work
Our systems are portable, and this is how every programme runs: we come to the horse. We work wherever there are racehorses — Dubai, Newmarket, Chantilly, Riyadh, Kentucky. The equipment, the protocol and the supervision arrive at your yard.
Shipping a horse in full work is disruptive and expensive, and for a horse on box rest it is out of the question. So we never ask. The horse stays in his own stable, on his own routine, with his own people, and the machine does the travelling.
It also changes the economics for a yard with several horses in the programme at once. One visit, one setup, multiple horses — which is usually a better proposition than sending them one at a time.
The programme prices above cover yards within the UAE. Everywhere else is quoted individually — it depends on the number of horses, the length of the programme, travel and the veterinary supervision required, so there is no sensible list price. Tell us where you are and what you have in mind, and we will put a figure together.
Enquire
Tell us the horse, the discipline, where the yard is, and what you are trying to change. We will tell you honestly whether this is likely to help — and what it would cost to come to you.
+971 4 321 9433
+971 50 321 9405
clinic@primavitadubai.com