This is an old show ring training trick for "trotty" walking horses.
Take then down a hill and teach them to "swing." The hopefully that
could be applied to the gait to move from a trotty gait ( or fox trot)
to a even four beat gait. With pacey horses you would use uphills to
square them up toward a trot and again hope you come carry that over
the the show ring.
When I was riding the mare she would absolutely fly down hills. when
she went lateral on me.
Truman
Karen Sullivan wrote:
----- Original Message -----
From: <heidi@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Yes, part of what makes an endurance horse is
biomechanical efficiency. (And again, the most biomechanically efficient
tend to be those who have good walks, good trots, good canters, AND the
versatility to break the trot up into a 4-beat gait downhill.)
That is extremely interesting, as that is exactly what my Anglo Arab taught
herself to do...
on the downhill pick up a singlefoot or broken pace. It was much faster
than a walk, and
fairly smooth.
On the level, the Anglo had the best trot of any horse I have had...and a
very smooth canter.
She started out a plodder at age 4 1/2....and by age 7 had developed a fast
walk.
Karen
