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ANALYSIS OF THE PASO FINO GAIT
By Fernando Montealegre R.

http://www.pasofinogait.com

INTRODUCTION

Since I knew Paso Fino horses, I have been astounded with their form at walk, by their smoothness and harmony as well as by the rapidity of their movements. Enlivened I felt growing my curiosity each time I saw a horse that moved with an astonishing rapidity, printing to its gait the stamp of its brio and vivacity, but carrying on its back a rider that seemed hung by invisible threads, that kept him static, indifferent to the roar produced under his seat.

I did not realize my amazement when I heard people talking about this topic, assuring that a horse was moving by laterals, making it in eight beats; where an unskilled eye as mine, only appreciated a broadside of very quick and rhythmic treads, but impossible to distinguish on the moving.

Encouraged by these incomprehensible matters for me, I proposed myself to find the answers to these and other similar questions. I looked up the books and magazines that were trying this topic and I looked up information that I could use to form my own opinion about this topic.

The most difficult part to be understood was the explanatory graphics of the eight beats or movements, they were not oriented enough to explain the harmony and smoothness that I was eagerly seeking to understand.

QUESTIONS

Determined to find a way to decipher this mystery, I came back to read again books and magazines, to check notes and get opinions, but from a different perspective this time. I attempted to discover under the light of a technical point of view :

~ How come a horse did to have a harmonious looking in its gait?
~ What the reason was to, in spite of executing movements very much complex than those done by a trotting horse, have its rider astonishingly more still?

~ What a sequence followed the movement of its limbs to give that pleasant sensation of continuous movement, without jumps of any kind and where its hoofs touched the soil with extraordinary regularity and synchronicity?

PREMISES

To continue with my study, I consider the recognized basis all over the sources that I consulted:

~ There are eight movements or beats that make up a complete cycle. ( Which, for demonstration purposes I will number 1 thru 8).
~ These eight movements are reduced to four, performed alternatively, once on the right side ( 1, 2, 3, and 4) and then on the left one ( 5, 6, 7 and 8).

~ In terms of the supports, or hoofs on those the horse is sustained, there are two kinds:

double (or on only two hoofs) and

triple (or on three hoofs)

~ During the eight movements, there are four triple supports (1, 3, 5 and 7), alternated with four double supports (2, 4, 6 and 8).
~ During the four triple supports, there are two of them executed by one foreleg and two hindlegs(1 and 5), alternated with two by one hindleg and two forelegs (3 and 7).

~ During the four double supports there are two executed by one foreleg and one opposite side hindleg (2 and 6), alternated with two by one foreleg and one hindleg of the same side (4 and 8).

~ During the diagonal supports (2 and 6), the foreleg and the opposite side hindleg in the air, are located inside the supports.

~ During the lateral supports (4 and 8), the foreleg and the hindleg from the same side in the air, are located outside the supports.

STARTING POINTS

Starting with what I had gathered, I tried to discover what I was lacking for. For this reason, I , and then attempted to prove them with the theories that would let me state the following :

Analyzing the graphics, exposed by the consulted authors about the decomposition of the movement, they all agree with the existence of eight beats or times.

Each hoof has five recognized times with support in land (or impulse phase), and three aerial (or recovery phase).

Considering the displacement of the horse, each extremity advances by the air in three of these eight times, in the sense of the movement of the horse. On the other side, in the impulse phase, once the hoof is put on the floor, this remains there without amending its support and is the body which is displaced, giving the impression that the hoof is moving in opposite sense; this happens in the other five movements.

If the horse is really soft for its rider, it must be other factor to consider: the horse must be well balanced; in other words, its own weight and the other of its rider always should be correctly balanced. As a result of these considerations, I suggested the possibility that in the triple supports, the foreleg or hindleg of simple support, must be found in the middle of its course or aplomb point (3), while the two feet or forelegs of the double support, should be in extreme opposite positions (1 and 5).

If the repeated cycle is compound by eight movements and if the treads are synchronized, and the horse have four feet, it is concluded that each two movements must be produced the contact of a hoof with the floor.

According to the already established supports, in a triple support, the unique hoof that is in the air is the one which must fall immediately, and so that is present that triple support (1, 3, 5 or 7), in that moment it must fall a hoof, because in the previous there was only a double support (2, 4, 6 or 8).

The eight movements, in which the consulted authors agree, are reduced to four alternatively repeated beats, by the right side and the left one;they are, in their order of execution, regarding their supports in the floor and the relative position that the hoofs should keep among them, the following:

1. - Two feet and one foreleg (l).

2. - One foot (r) and one foreleg (l) in diagonal.

3. - One foot (r) and two forelegs.

4. - One foot (r) and one foreleg (r) in lateral.

5. - Two feet and one foreleg (r).

6. - One foot (l) and one foreleg (r) in diagonal.

7. - One foot (l) and two forelegs.

8. - One foot (l) and one foreleg (l) in late