Horse gait

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This is an article on horse gaits, for other meanings see: gait (disambiguation).

Horse gaits are the different ways in which a horse, either naturally or through human training, can move.

Gaits can be roughly categorized into two groups: the ordinary gaits that nearly every horse will use without special training, and several other gaits that may appear spontaneously in some individuals but which usually require special training and/or special breeding to enable the rider to obtain them by communicating with the horse.

1 The ordinary gaits
2 Additional gaits
3 Further information on gaits
4 External links

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The ordinary gaits

The ordinary gaits are walk, trot, canter, and gallop (in increasing order of speed.) Some people count these as three gaits by considering the gallop a variation of the canter. Others count them as four separate gaits. All four gaits are seen in wild horse populations.

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Walk

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In this gait, the horse is alternately supported by three legs and two legs. The sequence of events is as follows. The left hind leg moves forward while the other three feet are on the ground. Then the left front foot is lifted, leaving the animal supported by the two right legs which are far apart, with the other two legs in between. The left hind foot hits the ground, and the animal is supported by three feet again. The right hind foot leaves the ground, and the horse is supported by two diagonal legs that are close together. The left front leg hits the ground, giving a three-legged support. Then the motion continues from the start, but with left and right reversed: the right front foot leaves the ground, the right hind foot hits the ground, the left hind foot leaves the ground, and the right front foot hits the ground, completing the cycle. The horse will move its head and neck to maintain its balance.

Ideally, the advancing rear hoof touches the ground ahead of the spot where the previously advancing front hoof touched the ground. This makes for a smoother and more comfortable walk. Individual horses and different breeds vary in the smoothness of their walk.

Essentially all mammals, when walking on four legs, follow the same sequence: left hind leg, left front leg, right hind leg, right front leg, in a regular 1-2-3-4 beat.

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Trot

Image:Trot.jpg Main article: Trot (horse gait).

In this gait, the horse moves its legs in unison in diagonal pairs. From the standpoint of the balance of the horse, this is a very stable gait, and the horse need not make major balancing motions with its head and neck. The trot is a two beat gait. The trot is often referred to as a jog.

The trot is the working gait for a horse. Horses in good condition can maintain a working trot for hours. Despite what one sees in movies, horses can only canter and gallop for short periods at a time, after which they need time to rest and recover.

Canter

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In the canter, one of the horse's rear legs, the right rear leg, for example, propels the horse forward. During this beat, the horse is supported only on that single leg while the remaining three legs are moving forward. On the next beat the horse catches itself on the left rear and right front legs while the other hind leg is still momentarily on the ground. On the third beat, the horse catches itself on the left front leg while the diagonal pair is momentarily still in contact with the ground.

The more-extended foreleg is referred to as the "lead". A horse initiating with the right rear leg would have the left front leg more extended, for example. This would be referred to as being on the "left lead".

Listening to a horse canter, one can in most cases hear the three stages of this movement as though a drum had been struck three times in succession. Then there is a rest, and immediately afterwards the three-beat occurs again. At liberty, individual horses may tend to prefer to lead with either the left or right hind foot. Horses lean into a turn, so the leading foot matters most during tight turns. If, for instance, the horse is turning to the left, then the horse's left front foot is more likely to be the one that is extended farther to the front. Horses learn to balance themselves around turns by adjusting their lead to the direction of their turn.

When a rider is added to the horse's natural balance, the question of the lead becomes more important. When riding in an enclosed area such as an arena, the correct lead provides the horse with better balance. The rider typically signals the horse which lead to adopt when moving from a slower gait into the canter. In addition, when jumping over fences, the rider typically signals the horse to land on the correct lead to approach the next fence or turn. The rider can also request the horse to switch from one lead to another (the "flying lead change" or "flying change") while moving in a straight line. This switch is also a feature of dressage and reining schooling and competition.

The word is commonly said to be short for "Canterbury-gallop", but it may come from an expression meaning "corner-gallop".

Working canter: the natural canter given by a horse, with "normal" stride length. [1] [2]

Medium canter: a canter between the working canter and extended canter. It is bigger and rounder than the working, very forward with moderate extension. [3] [4]

Collected canter: an extremely engaged, collected gait (balance is shifted toward the hindquarters) where the strides are shorter and bouncier and the horse's frame is short and compressed. [5] [6] (Note: the second picture of the collected canter is a canter pirouette, which is a movement. However, a collected canter is needed for a canter pirouette, and it is possible to seen the short stride and compressed frame of the horse).

Extended canter: an extension of the canter, where the horse's frame lengthens and the horse takes larger stride, with the horse covering as much ground as possible without losing the 3-beat gait. It is very engaged. [7] [8]

Lope: seen in western horses, the canter is preformed on a loose rein. There is less suspension than a working canter, and the horse has a longer frame, but the gait is still 3-beat and the horse is well-engaged. [9] [10]

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Gallop

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The gallop is very much like the canter and feels the same, except the three-beat canter changes to a four-beat movement. After a moment of suspension, where all feet are off the ground, the four feet hit the ground individually, the hind feet before the front feet. When the legs are stretched out, at least one foot is in contact with the ground. When all four feet are off the ground, the legs are bent rather than extended (in contrast with old "classic" paintings of running horses).

In a right-lead gallop, the sequence of events is as follows:

After the phase of suspension, the left hind foot hits the ground, then the right hind foot, placed about 1 meter in front of the left hind foot.
Then the left hind foot leaves the ground, and immediately afterwards the left front foot hits the ground. The horse is now supported on two diagonal legs, about 2.1 meters apart.
The right hind foot leaves the ground, and then the right front foot hits the ground, placed about 1.55m in front of the left front foot.
The left foot leaves the ground.
Finally, the right foot provides the push-off to reach the phase of suspension again.

Note that when a horse jumps over a fence, the legs are stretched out while in the air, and the front legs hit the ground before the hind legs, which is completely different from the suspended phase of a gallop. Image:Muybridge race horse gallop.jpg Image:Muybridge race horse animated 184px.gif In 1892, Leland Stanford settled an argument about whether galloping horses were ever fully airborne: he paid photographer Eadweard Muybridge to devise an apparatus with multiple trip wires attached to camera shutters. The photos, the first documented example of high-speed photography, clearly showed the horse airborne.

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Additional gaits

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The pace

As in the trot, two feet are always off the ground. In the trot, the two legs diagaonally opposite from each other move together; in the pace, the two legs on the same side of the horse move together. The trot is more common, but some breeds of horses prefer to pace. Horses can be raced at a trot or pace, usually when pulling a sulkey. Among standardbreds, to whom almost all such races are restricted, pacers breed truer than trotters – that is, trotting sires have a higher proportion of pacers among their get than pacing sires do of trotters. Pacers are also faster than trotters on the average.

The true two beat pace is rather uncomfortable for riding, as not only is the rider going up and down, as in trotting, but also side to side, like riding a camel. A stepping pace, one of the smooth "gaits" of gaited horses, may have been the gait sometimes used for transport of wounded.

The majority of Icelandic Horses can pace (most of those can also tölt, and are thus called "five-gaited". The five gaits are walk, trot, canter, tölt, pace). Good pacers are held in high regard, but for a pacer to stand out he has to be able to perform the pace at a high speed. [11] Slow pacing in Icelandic horses is considered a major flaw. A horse that goes at a slow pace, or piggy-pace, is called lullari.

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The slow gait

This gait follows the same general sequence of movement as the walk, but the rhythm and collection of the movements are different. The slow gait was developed from the pace, a gait that can currently be seen in harness racing. In the pace, both legs on the left side move together and then both legs on the right side move together. The speed of the two-beat pace is even faster than the trot. If the length of the stride is kept long, but there is a slight gap between the foots-falls, the result is a gait that will be intermediate in speed between the walk and the pace, but very smooth.

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The rack

Template:Copyedit In the rack, the speed is increased to be approximately that of the pace, but instead of being a two-beat gait like the trot and the pace, it is a four-beat gait with equal intervals between each beat. It is difficult to sit in a fast trot because the body of the horse actually falls between beats. Each time another diagonal pair of legs hits the ground, the rider is given a strong upward impulsion and meets the horse with some force on the way back down. But in the rack the impulsive "explosions" are each divided in half because the hooves hit the ground individually rather in pairs.

The rack is hardwired in the "racking horse". A racking horse can rack as easily as other horses trot or canter. It should be noted, that although there are claims made as to the legitimacy of the "Racking Horse" as a stand-alone breed (given that designation by the USDA in 1978), that "Racking" is a gait that that is also known historically as the "Virginia Single-foot Gait," with many breeds of horses capable of producing this gait and entered into Racking events.

Riding the rack is like riding on a comfortable chair that slightly sways your hips gently from side to side. To achieve this gait the horse must be in a "hollow position". This means that, instead of a rounded back as seen in dressage horses and those that work off their hind quarters, the spine is curved downward. The downside of this is that this position weakens the back and makes the horse less able to carry the weight of the rider without strain.

This puts the racking horse in the best position to rack without breaking into another gait. If the rider sits back or leans slightly back this will cause the hollow back, or the back to curve downward. This allows the legs to trail and makes the rack easier for the horse.

A speed racker can achieve speeds of a fast canter. The ride is smooth, and the rider appears to remain motionless as the horse racks. The horse's tail naturally is raised without nicking. The horse itself maintains a fairly still head and most of the action is in the tail and legs.

The Racking Association's goal is to preserve the Racking Horse in a natural state with little or no artificial devices that enhance gait. Some classes allow special shoes that enhance the gait but chains and other devices are not allowed. (The latter is practice known as "soring," so-called because a horse alters its gait due to discomfort or sore feet caused by some of these devices. This is a federal offense within the United State of America under the provisions of the HPA.)

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The foxtrot

Main article: Fox trot.

The foxtrot is most often associated with the Missouri Foxtrotter breed, but is also seen under different names in other gaited breeds. The foxtrot is a four-beat diagonal gait in which the front foot of the diagonal pair lands before the hind, eliminating the moment of suspension and giving a "no bounce" ride. The foxtrot is a comfortable gait for trail-riding. An example of the foxtrot may be seen here [12].

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The tölt

Tölt is a gait that is often described as being unique to the Icelandic Horse. In its pure form, the footfalls are the same as in rack, but the Icelandic horse is bred for more freedom and liquidity of movement. The most prized horses have a very long stride and high lift with their forelegs. [13] Icelandic Riders will demonstrate the smoothness of a tölt by going at the speed of a gallop without spilling a drink they hold. However, some of the breed have a tölt that is considered imperfect, and may be described as a "trotty tölt" or a "pacey tölt". [14].

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Further information on gaits

At the full canter (or full gallop) and at the extremely collected canter, the impacts of the two diagonally related legs are sufficiently separated in time to be differentiated. At this time one will hear a four-beat canter.

If a horse is deliberately instructed to take a left turn on the right lead, or vice-versa, this is called a "counter canter" ("counter gallop"). Moderate use of this gait by an informed rider may be useful in the athletic training of the horse, but a horse that is still not sufficiently athletically developed to handle the difficult balancing act involved may try to compensate in ways detrimental to its well-being and to its training.

There are several specialized breeds of horses with special genetic inheritance of which facilitates the spontaneous or trained appearance of other gaits such as the pace (in which the legs move in lateral pairs rather than diagonal pairs), the slow gait, the rack, etc. The American Saddlebred has been selectively bred to easily learn the walk, trot, gallop, slow gait, and rack. The Peruvian Paso and Paso Fino are two breeds which have a smooth, innate gait sometimes known as the running walk or the paso corto, paso largo, and paso fino. Another breed famous for its distinctive mode of locomotion is the Tennessee Walking Horse.

Other names for the intermediate gaits, some smoother, some less so, are singlefooting, amble, Indian shuffle, running walk, stepping pace, fox trot, rack, tolt.

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