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RE: [RC] ] gait vs leg stress - Stagg_Newman

Am not an expert on dynamic confirmation of the horse so this is
based more on experience and observation than analysis.

My experience is that some horses are built to be trotting horses
and some are built to canter.  One way to find out in addition to
"listening to the horse" is to ride the horse with a heart monitor
and see what happens as you change gaits say from a
good working trot to an easy canter.  For both of my prime
two horses, Drubin and Super the pulse stays about the same.
Since the easy canter covers a bit more ground than the working
trot they actually are more efficient at the canter.  My wife's
horse Strut whom had done over 15 100s was definitely
a trotting horse.  His pulse would go up at least 5 beats
when he went into a canter.  Interestingly at a steady trot
he could go up a 5 to 10 mile several 1000 foot climb
(when we lived out West) without slowing.  On the other
hand Drubin's son, Bahrain, whom we had before Ellen
Tully, is a cantering type of horse.  His pulse would go down
at least 5 beats when he switched from a trot to a canter.

That said one has to be very careful not to pull a horse
along at faster than his comfortable middle gaits, otherwise
you asking for potential lameness or metabolic problems.
One of our challenges when we rode Drubin and Strut
together in 100s (they finished many together) was to
not let Drubin pull Strut along too fast.  This happened
a couple of times and Strut would thump or get a
labile pulse and Cheryl would have to withdraw.
BTW Drubin is 14h1 and Strut was 15h1 but Drubin had much
bigger gaits so it not about size.

With Super and our 7 year old Cam, we are making a conscious
decision to not ride together unless we are just taking Super
in a slow competition for training as Super has much bigger
natural medium gaits even though at a flat out gallop in the field
Cam is faster.

Stagg Newman



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