The marginal gains philosophy is based on the view that a series of small, positive improvements in training and race or competition day processes, will cumulatively result in a significant improvement in competition performance and ultimately contribute greatly to increased success. When seeking potential marginal gains, all areas of the entire process of bringing a horse to a big competition or to the racecourse would need to be evaluated, to look for elements that could be improved by just a small amount. In isolation a 1% difference in performance may not be noticeable, particularly given all the other variables that affect performance on race or competition day.
