Ridecamp: Re: [RC] TWH transition to canter

Ray,

Ain't it the truth. The canter requires the horse to use one diagonal 
pair - the pair depending on lead. It's harder than the dickes for the 
horse to go for a strickly lateral gait to a canter without a whole lot 
of effort. From a running walk its a piece of cake. And you are right 
it's sure hard to find this ability in the "new age" walking horse 
stock. That's why I like the old blood lines and that's why that's what 
I  breed. It's getting harder and harder evey year - but they are out 
there.

Good to see you are still around.

Truman

Ridecamp Guest wrote:

> Ray O'Donohue rno2m@xxxxxxxxxxxx 
> IF your horse does a true RunningWalk-which is increasingly uncommon nowadays,thanks to the Big Lick Show Genetics-your transition to canter is a guaranteed piece of cake-too easy,in fact,as has been pointed out.For the rest of the gaited horses,the transition can sometimes be tricky,especially if he is doing the most common gait,the Stepping Pace.Anyway,don't worry about just what the name is for your horse's gait.If he ain't nodding his head very strongly and transitioning up and back seamlessly between "the gait" and a lope,he's not doing a RunningWalk,and you are in the same boat with 90% of us.I find that leaning forward a bit helps the horse to somehow switch his legs/leads,and that this whole cross cantering thing usually improves a lot with practice and a lot of hilly work or cantering in meadow/high grass areas.Chico used to do it all the time,and now he never does.A nice fast breakover at the rear shoes might help too.I have formed the opinion now that there is no safer way to travel moderately fast in very bad terrain than a RunningWalk/Lope combo.Thanks to the TWH show horse people,that kind of horse is now hard to acquire!
>
>
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