Re: watch your step! - Trotting downhill

[CMKSAGEHIL <CMKSAGEHIL@aol.com>]

In a message dated 98-05-19 19:13:45 EDT, jtaylor@pyramid.net writes:

<< I have spent a good part of my years with some of the old time endurance
 riders. Fitzgeralds, M Arnold, C Lewis, S. Killen anyway they always
 told me only to trot or gallop down hill if it is absoultly necessary. >>

Ah, but what they said and what they did sometimes varied considerably...  I
remember an article written by Cliff Lewis many years ago entitled:  "Rocks,
Downhill, and Darkness--A Fat Man's Secret Weapons."  His premise (and I would
tend to concur) was that weight is more of a handicap when the horse has to
defy gravity and lift it UP.  Downhill the weight was not such a handicap (and
he had some interesting trials he had run to illustrate the point), and he
contended that in all three circumstances a savvy rider could outride the not-
so-savvy to great advantage.  Sure have seen both him and Pat Fitzgerald belt
down hills on occasion!

Heidi