I have Magnum trot down hills as long as they
are not too steep. Too steep to me means he
is not balancing backwards on to his hind
quarters (or at least trying to... no false claims
here about how good he is at this yet!) and
I am too far forward... putting what I think is
too much weight on his front legs. But this
is all relative. When we trot down a grade
he and I ARE putting more weight on his front
than if we are flat or up hill. Physics. However,
if we do not train at the trot down hill, neither
of us will learn how to balance properly. It's
a goal for us as a team. I post. I post a LOT.
Magnum is rough at the trot and posting is a
way for me to keep my balance and sanity.
I post down hill, but try to move my center
of gravity back as far as possible. [insert:
OK Val, stop ROTFL. I know this is
not what we look like in REAL life... makes
a great story though! :) ] We trot down hill
in training on good footing only... no old
asphalt. No uneven, 1/2 buried rocks.
No use in my trying to run. ;-) If the two of
us are going to end up walking anyways, I
may as well be sitting on him!
>How fast do you go on a slight downhill with good footing. Do you
>get off and run? Do you fast trot, slow canter?
We do a fast trot on the flat. We still need to
slow this down uphills as after only a year of
real training, Magnum is not yet in peak condition.
>Do you trot and canter downhill on competition? At all during
>conditioning?
We trotted down hill on the ride and I intend
to continue to trot down hill at rides. We will
not be able to balance properly at the canter
down hill. The weight of the horse and rider
must be way back, and I doubt Magnum will
ever be able to achive this gait. After all,
according to Deb Bennet he should be used
for racing or put out as a lawn ornament and
I should not be trying to use him for a saddle
mount... ;-)
We train twice a week. Mid week is about
10 - 15 miles of walk - trot and some canter
on the flat or uphill. Our weekend ride is
over 20 miles about the same. I can tell
that Magnum is just begining to get enough
wind to do an up hill canter stretch without
getting too winded to finish a long ride. I
put this near the end since he still tries to
burn all his energy in a burst of speed.
Funny, I didn't feel he was capable of
completeing a 25 mile ride right out of
the pasture. We did a lot of conditioning
before our first ride in July. I'm pretty sure
he's up to 50 now, but Las Trampas will
tell us for sure. On this list we all know
that 25 miles is easy for a horse, but to the
general barn horse public, it sounds like
riding forever!
:) - kat
kathy.myers@syntex.com
Magnum the 14 yr old ex-race horse who still
has energy to burn