Equestrian sports involve horses as partners in athletic endeavors. Welfare standards in competition are evolving, with greater emphasis on horse-centered indicators of wellbeing.
Competition horse welfare requires balancing athletic performance goals with the horse's physical and psychological health. The most significant welfare concerns in equestrian sport are musculoskeletal injuries from high-impact training, gastric ulcers from management practices incompatible with equine digestive physiology, lameness, and training methods that use fear or pain as motivators. A welfare-positive approach to equestrian competition prioritizes training techniques the horse can opt into, management that provides ad libitum roughage and social contact, fitness conditioning that prevents injury, and willingness to retire horses from competition when their wellbeing is compromised. The shift toward using ear-mounted accelerometers, facial expression analysis, and cardiac monitoring during competition allows objective welfare assessment during events. Judges and officials trained in welfare science can enforce standards more effectively.