I just finished my second 50 on a mft and my wife
did her first 30 LD on hers. I also completed the 30 on a twh. All of these
have, thank God, been both succesful and top 10. This all depends on the horse
and training that goes into the animal. The gait issue is kind of complex
as it has many different angles. It also gets into gait of choice for the horse
and whether you can change gaits to give the horse different breaks of its
muscle fatigue.
On the mftr issue, let me say that neither
of the mftrs we are using actually foxtrot, we have them that do, just not these
two. They flat foot walk, running walk, rack and canter. The rack is their gait
of choice.
None of our foxtrotting horses (so
far) show enough speed to make me feel good about putting them on their feet
long enough from a fatique point of view, to make me think they will make
endurance horses. But, those two are 3 and 4 respectfully and still coming along
anyway.
Lets not forget that the Tennessee Walkers and
the Paso Finos are doing really, really well in this sport. They both were
bred to have stamina. A friend of mine finished a fairly tough 100 miler last
month up in this region on his Paso Fino who is only about 14.2 hds and the
rider is a heavyweight. Foxtrotters are very nice but lets not forget to
acknowledge that there are some other gaited breeds making a mark out there. I
live in a region that has 2 gaited teams and they are fairly high in the
points right now.
--------Karla/NW region
(who just bought herself a Paso Fino mare who
has yet to get tired on conditioning rides)
