To hark back to an earlier topic....what the h--- is a 'disunited trot?'
In my book (admittedly a classical horsemanship/dressage background)
either a horse is trotting, or it is not trotting. And a trot is RH/LF
together...LH/RF together (or vice versa) with a moment of suspension
between the two footfalls.
It is true that when you extend this gait, the horse is inclined to
reach up with its hind foot and 'clip' the back of its front foot, on
the same side. I can see how disuniting the footfalls (so it becomes a
gait in fourtime rather than in two time???) might reduce this tendency.
I have several questions about this gait:
1) Does it still have its moment(s) of suspension? If so, then,
since the diagonal pairs are no longer united, there has to be some time
during the course of a stride when the horse has only one foot on the
ground (i.e. the entire weight of the horse's body is being borne by a
single leg).
It is my understanding that the reason the trot is generally considered
the gait of choice (over the canter) for endurance horses is that the
horse never has only one foot on the ground (and therefore is never
required to bear its entire weight on only one leg...as it does in the
canter). In a true trot, this is true; however, in the extended
'disunited trot' this ceases to be the case. In which event, why bother
with the gait at all; why not just let your horse canter? Or does the
'disunited trot' not have any moments of suspension?
I must confess to total confusion here. If somebody can explain to me
not only the foot falls, but the foot risings (to coin a word) as well, I
would appreciate it.
2) If the main benefit of trotting (weight bearing on at least two
legs) over cantering is lost by disuniting the diagonals, are there
other benefits to this gait over the canter? And if so, what are they?
3) This question is for any of you standardbred people out there. I
am curious as to what is the gait requirement for a 'trotter' in
competition, because if all (or many) of the horses are disuniting the
diagonal, clearly 'trotters' are not required to actually trot. Is the
requirement just that they not canter/gallop? Or is it that they have
to appear to be trotting, even if a close analysis of their gait in slow
motion reveals that they aren't trotting at all?
kat
Orange County, Calif.