The scoop is the
wrong measure
Every supplement label makes a promise about what goes in the scoop. But a horse is built to ferment fiber, not to break down a concentrated powder, and a powder has to dissolve before any of it counts, with oral availability measured in horses as low as 3%. Every 100X formula is veterinary-formulated and already in solution, delivered in liquid form with up to 99% availability.
Liquid delivery science.
Most equine supplements use powders or pellets, formats that must dissolve and survive gastrointestinal processing before any of it becomes available. Liquid skips that step.
This isn’t marketing, it’s physiology. Liquid delivery has been the gold standard in human medicine for decades. We brought that science to equine nutrition.
Powders and pellets require dissolution and gastrointestinal processing before systemic availability is possible. Published work on orally administered equine ingredients like glucosamine and chondroitin shows oral availability can be limited and ingredient-dependent.
100X Equine’s liquid formulations bypass the dissolution barrier entirely. Our pre-solubilized nutrients are immediately available for uptake across the gastrointestinal lining, reaching up to 99% availability.
Availability comparison
Percent of the dose available for uptake. The bright line marks the low end of the published pellet and powder range.
What a powder is up against
Five physical barriers stand between a labeled ingredient and a horse’s bloodstream. None of them appear on a guaranteed analysis, and all five are decided by the format rather than the recipe.
The rule that governs all five
Dissolution rate
Surface area×Solubility×Concentration gradient
How fast and how completely a solid releases into gut fluid is set by three things: the surface area exposed to that fluid, the ingredient’s solubility in it, and the concentration gradient at the absorbing surface. Not one of the three is printed on a label, and all three are determined by the form the ingredient arrives in.
The biopharmaceutics classification framework separates absorption limited by solubility from absorption limited by permeability. A pre-solubilized liquid removes the solubility-limited step before the dose ever reaches the horse, which is why the same molecule can behave so differently in two different formats.
Four things have to happen before a nutrient counts
Dissolve
A powder or pellet has to break down into solution before anything can cross a membrane.
Liquid starts hereSurvive the stomach
What is left has to hold up through gastric acid and hindgut fermentation.
Cross the lining
Only dissolved, intact molecules move across the gastrointestinal lining.
Reach the tissue
Whatever is absorbed has to arrive at the joint, gut, or muscle in a usable dose.
Powders and pellets have to clear all four. A pre-solubilized liquid is already past the first one, which is the step where most of the dose is lost.
Why format matters
“What your horse can’t absorb, your horse can’t use.”
Dr. Russ PetersonDVM · MS · DACVSMR · Cert. ISELP ·
47+ YearsChief Veterinary Officer & Head of Equine Science, 100X Equine
“Where is the clinical trial on Gut X?”
It is a question that sounds like rigor and gets the science backwards. Most supplements, human and animal, are sold on ingredient-level evidence rather than a dedicated trial on the finished product. That is not a shortcut. It is how supplement science works.
Walk the aisle of any supplement store. The creatine, the magnesium, the fish oil, the collagen, the vitamin D: virtually none of those finished products has its own clinical trial. Each one stands on the published, peer-reviewed evidence for the ingredients inside it. A finished-product trial is the exception, reserved for one specific situation, not the baseline.
Gut X · Hyaluronan + beta glucan, delivered in liquid
The principle
The evidence a product owes scales with how novel its claim is.
An ingredient characterized across decades of controlled research carries that evidence with it. You do not re-prove magnesium every time you put it in a bottle. Mechanism is established first at the level of the molecule, so a formula built on well-documented molecules starts with that evidence already in hand. The real scientific question is whether the finished formulation preserves, presents, and delivers those molecules in a way that lets them do their job.
Where the regulatory line actually sits
A novel chemical entity making a disease claim must clear finished-product trials and pre-market approval before it can be sold, a process famously measured in more than a decade and well over a billion dollars. A supplement operates under a different framework, built around established, characterized ingredients and governed in practice by the FDA’s Center for Veterinary Medicine and state feed-control frameworks that often rely on AAFCO ingredient standards. No finished-product trial is required, not because the bar is lower for convenience, but because the ingredients already carry their evidence and the claim is support, not treatment.
And a small trial is not automatically stronger
Skeptics tend to invert this one. A lone twenty-animal study on a single finished product, unreplicated, can tell you less than a literature of controlled studies on the molecule itself. Ingredient and mechanistic research answer a different question than a product trial does, and for an established active, that body of evidence is doing real work rather than standing in for something better.
So the honest question is the two-part one any veterinarian would actually ask
Do the active ingredients have a real, published, peer-reviewed body of evidence behind them?
Answer: YesIs the finished formula built and validated well enough to let those ingredients do their job?
Answer: YesFor Gut X, both answers are yes. It is not built on hope and it is not built on reviews. It is built on three things.
Hyaluronic acid
The structural work
A native component of connective tissue and mucosal-associated extracellular matrices, and highly mucoadhesive, which is exactly why it is relevant at the gut lining. It does not need to enter the bloodstream or behave like a drug tablet to matter there. Its action is local, at the surface, which is precisely where barrier support begins.
Beta glucan
The immune work
Recognized by dedicated receptors, including dectin-1 and complement receptor 3, on gut-associated immune tissue. That receptor binding is the mechanism behind its documented immune activity. Oral beta glucan has been studied in horses with measured immunological endpoints: published, in-animal data.
The liquid
The delivery work
Both molecules only matter if they reach the lining in a usable form. Hyaluronic acid has to be hydrated and in contact with the mucosa to adhere to it. Beta glucan has to be dispersed across the immune surface to be recognized by it. A powder or pellet has to disintegrate and dissolve first, and that step is neither complete nor uniform.
The bottom line
A finished-product trial is the right tool in exactly one situation: when the claim is genuinely novel and the literature does not yet exist.
That is not the Gut X situation. Hyaluronic acid and beta glucan each carry substantial peer-reviewed literatures across human and animal research. The second question is a formulation question, and it is work we have done: stability, dispersion, delivery, and mucosal presentation are the variables that decide whether ingredient science survives the trip from the label to the horse.
One distinction worth keeping straight: Gut X is a daily gut-support supplement. Omeprazole and sucralfate are prescription drugs for diagnosed disease. Different categories, held to different standards, for good reason.
Peer-reviewed · BMC Veterinary Research, 2026
So we put the new claim
through peer review.
Hydra-MAX was the exception, and it proves the standard. An electrolyte, creatine, and glycerol combination like it was a first of its kind, and the combined effect was not already established in the literature. A novel claim owes new evidence, so we ran the study in horses, submitted it to independent review, and published it in BMC Veterinary Research.
Hydra-MAX · The formula in the published study
What the study found
Greater plasma volume expansion than water alone
Body mass preserved through the hydration period
Increased voluntary water intake
Peterson, R., & Dietrich, J. (2026). Post-exercise hydration responses to an electrolyte, glycerol, and creatine supplement in horses: a preliminary study. BMC Veterinary Research.
That is the standard this company holds. We stand on the science where it already exists, and where it does not, we put the new claim through peer review and let the data stand on its own. We do not ask of established ingredients a standard we have not held our own new claims to.
We are not asking you to take our word for it. We are asking you to read the work.
Dr. Russ Peterson
DVM · MS · DACVSMR · Cert. ISELP
Chief Veterinary Officer & Head of Equine Science, 100X Equine
With 47+ years in equine veterinary medicine, Dr. Peterson brings clinical rigor to supplement formulation. Board-certified in veterinary sports medicine and rehabilitation, he has treated thousands of performance horses across every major discipline.
Every 100X Equine formula is developed under Dr. Peterson’s direct oversight, from ingredient selection and dosing to clinical validation with 100X Labs, our clinical research arm.
We don’t white-label and we don’t rebrand generic formulas. Every product is purpose-built with clinically studied ingredients and delivered in the format the science supports, liquid.
Full credentials
Education
- DVM, Doctor of Veterinary Medicine, University of California, Davis (1979)
- MS, Animal Nutrition, University of California, Davis
- BS, Biology, Claremont Men’s College
Board certifications
- DACVSMR, Diplomate, American College of Veterinary Sports Medicine & Rehabilitation
- Cert. ISELP, International Society of Equine Locomotor Pathology
Clinical practice
- Co-Founder, Peninsula Equine, 1979 to present (sport horse and performance medicine)
- 47+ years managing complex medical and surgical cases in equine sports medicine
- Advanced imaging, locomotor evaluation, and orthobiologics (CelaVet stem cells, Arthramid, Noltrex)
Research contributions
- Early development of Platinum Performance (prior to its 1996 founding)
- Major involvement in the first clinical trial of GastroGard
- Ongoing scientific oversight of 100X Equine formulation and clinical trial strategy
Professional service & societies
- Founder and Board Member, Association of Equine Sports Medicine (1984)
- UC Davis External Advisory Board (1986)
- California Veterinary Licensing Board Examination Committee (1993 to present)
- Founding Member and Board of Directors, ISELP; national and international instructor
Science in every formula.
One liquid delivery platform, formulated by Dr. Peterson and dosed by the pump. Here is the science behind each protocol, with its sources.
Gut & Immune Support
Gut X
The equine GI system is central to nutrient utilization, microbial fermentation, and mucosal integrity. Gut X supports the entire tract, from stomach lining integrity to hindgut fermentation balance, and the liquid format reaches the gut lining directly.
Joint, Soft Tissue & Bone
Osteo-MAX
Performance horses carry heavy repetitive load on joints, tendons, ligaments, and bone. Published equine work shows oral glucosamine and chondroitin availability is limited and ingredient-dependent; liquid delivery targets the inflammatory cascade at therapeutic doses.
Mobility
Joint Flex Plus
Everyday joint flexibility and comfort for all horses. Built on the same joint science, delivered in liquid so studied actives arrive at usable, consistent doses rather than being lost to limited oral uptake.
Hydration & Electrolytes
Hydra-MAX
Clinically evaluated in a peer-reviewed cross-over study: greater plasma volume expansion, preserved body mass, and increased voluntary water intake compared to water alone.
Topline & Muscle
Amino-MAX
A liquid amino acid profile formulated to support topline development, muscle recovery, and body condition in working and growing horses, delivered so the profile arrives complete and usable at each feeding.
Calm & Focus
Max Calm
A liquid calming formula to support focus and a settled temperament under stress and travel, without dulling the horse, delivered for fast, consistent availability at each dose.
- Amidon, G. L., Lennernäs, H., Shah, V. P., & Crison, J. R. (1995). A theoretical basis for a biopharmaceutic drug classification: the correlation of in vitro drug product dissolution and in vivo bioavailability. Pharmaceutical Research, 12(3), 413–420.
- Shah, V. P., Amidon, G. L., Lennernäs, H., Yu, L. X., Crison, J. R., et al. (2006). Biopharmaceutics classification system: the scientific basis for biowaiver extensions. Pharmaceutical Research, 23(10), 2262–2271.
- Julliand, V., & Grimm, P. (2016). The impact of diet on the hindgut microbiome. Journal of Equine Veterinary Science, 39, S23–S28.
- Costa, M. C., Silva, G., Ramos, R. V., Staempfli, H. R., Arroyo, L. G., Kim, P., & Weese, J. S. (2015). Characterization and comparison of the bacterial microbiota in different gastrointestinal tract compartments in horses. The Veterinary Journal, 205(1), 74–80.
- Sykes, B. W., Hewetson, M., Hepburn, R. J., Luthersson, N., & Tamzali, Y. (2015). ECEIM Consensus Statement, Equine Gastric Ulcer Syndrome in adult horses. Journal of Veterinary Internal Medicine, 29(5), 1288–1299.
- Goodrich, L. R., & Nixon, A. J. (2006). Medical treatment of osteoarthritis in the horse, a review. The Veterinary Journal, 171(1), 51–69.
- McIlwraith, C. W., Frisbie, D. D., & Kawcak, C. E. (2012). The horse as a model of naturally occurring osteoarthritis. Bone & Joint Research, 1(11), 297–309.
- Du, J., White, N., & Eddington, N. D. (2004). The bioavailability and pharmacokinetics of glucosamine hydrochloride and chondroitin sulfate after oral and intravenous administration in the horse. Biopharmaceutics & Drug Disposition, 25(3), 109–116.
- Dowling, B. A., Dart, A. J., Hodgson, D. R., & Smith, R. K. W. (2000). Superficial digital flexor tendonitis in the horse. Equine Veterinary Journal, 32(5), 369–378.
- Dressman, J. B., & Reppas, C. (2000). In vitro–in vivo correlations for lipophilic, poorly water-soluble drugs. European Journal of Pharmaceutical Sciences, 11(Suppl 2), S73–S80.
- Peterson, R., & Dietrich, J. (2026). Post-exercise hydration responses to an electrolyte, glycerol, and creatine supplement in horses: a preliminary study. BMC Veterinary Research. doi.org/10.1186/s12917-026-05493-w
- Picetti, T. S., Soveral, L. de F., Miotto, R., Erpen, L. M. S., Kreutz, Y., Guizzo, J. A., et al. (2021). Orally administered β-glucan improves the hemolytic activity of the complement system in horses. Veterinary World, 14(4), 835–840. doi.org/10.14202/vetworld.2021.835-840
Nutrition your horse can actually use.
Start with Gut X, the liquid foundation every protocol builds on. Formulated by Dr. Peterson, dosed by the pump, backed by the research.
Start with Gut X