AUGUST 2006 • VOLUME 12 • ©HORSES For LIFE™ Magazine

Some trainers are appalled at what they see in the show ring today. Saying that we have lost the purity of the gaits. Especially the purity of the trot.

So what exactly are they talking about and why should it matter?

For the trot to be pure it requires that the horse places the two legs involved in each diagonal down at the same time, that they be perfectly synchronized.

Research has shown us that this is not necessarily true that often especially with those horses that has expressive extended trots that there actually was a positive associated displacement.

What is positive associated displacement?

This displacement refers to the two legs in the diagonal in a trot, and how the hind leg lands before the front leg of the same diagonal, this is what makes it positive.

In the trot one diagonal would be the left hind and the right foreleg that work in unison, and the right hind and the left leg would be the other diagonal.

Some suggest that the hind leg landing before the front leg of the same diagonal actually is what makes the extended trot of today so spectacular basically creating more air time for the horse for his front legs, creating better and more spectacular extensions. Some suggest that this positive displacement has always been there and that our eyes was just not quick enough to see it happening.

Others suggest that while yes there may be a positive displacement on the hind end, there will also be a negative displacement on the front end at the end of the stride of that diagonal. The hind leg landing first but also lifting first before the front leg. One that places the horse on his front end at the end of that stride, which is not advantageous to the horse.

One of the changes we have seen in the past few years is a change in a much more expressive extended trot. But what is the price? From the horse's perspective there is a very good reason to have purity in the gaits. A biomechanical reason.

When supporting the weight of the horse, from a biomechanical perspective what would be better, standing on one, two, three, or four legs. It does not take a rocket scientist to figure out that four legs are better than three, three better then two and two better then one. The more legs supporting the weight the less strain upon ligaments and tendons and the skeletal structure of the horse.

Many of us are aware on the racehorse Barbaro, a horse on his way to fame who in front of millions of viewers his pastern literally blew up.

All Photos of Barbaros by Sabina Louise Pierce/University of Pennsylvania  All rights reserved. www.sabinalouisepierce.com

Reconnected the pulverized right hind leg of Kentucky Derby winner Barbaro, a dark bay thoroughbred who charged ahead by 6 1/2 lengths to win at Churchill Downs _ only to break down seconds out of the gate at the Preakness Stakes in Baltimore, his foot flaring at gruesome angles before a gasping crowd at Pimlico Race Course and millions of television viewers.

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