Re: RC: RE: Gaited horses and endurance

[Lynn Kinsky <lkinsky@silcom.com>]

>Sharon,
>
>	Question, your comment about letting a gaited horse trot caught my
>attention.  I ran into a breeder of MFT at the Wild Winds ride, he told me
>that all square gaits are fine (i.e. foxtrot, trot) but the gait to avoid is
>the pace which is a lateral gait.  He suggested I "trot" my MFT over poles
>to improve her gaits and discourage any pacing.  Now I'm confused.
>
>
>Dawna

Strictly speaking, what he meant was that all *diagonal* gaits are fine --
a "square" gait is neither laternal nor diagonal and is the ideal 4-beat
gait of most gaited horses (paso llano for Peruvians, tolt for Icelandics,
foxtrot for MFTs, etc.).  That said -- the MFT is a horse with a gait that
tends to the diagonal and I think the Mangalarga Marchador does also.  Even
in the 4 beat gait the footfall order goes by the diagonal sequence, and as
speed is increased and the footfals are less evenly spaced the horse will
move closer to a trot.

On the laterally gaited horses (PP, PF, Icelandic, Rocky Mountain, TWH,
etc.) the footfall order goes in a lateral sequence and with increasing
speed they will tend towards the pace.  In those horses any tendency to the
trot (diagonal) is strongly discouraged.

An athletic and well trained horse is capable of doing all gaits (I've seen
a few PPs trained by expert dressage-based trainers who can switch between
walk, gait, trot, pace and canter on comand) but for ordinary riding
sticking with the usual gaits for the breed is best.  To get more speed in
a gaited horse without "ruining" its gait,  go to the canter.

Lynn Kinsky (Santa Ynez, CA)
http://www.silcom.com/~lkinsky



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