I just watched the recent video of Totilas.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dj78ubYSlak
It struck me that his front in passage and extended trot is very similar to a Spanish trot.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iiS-GciTz5E&feature=related
Obvious beauty and talent but I thought the Spanish trot was not allowed in competition. Thoughts?
Oh lord.
This is how the horse moves.
Can we please quit analyzing every little bit and coming up with conspiracy theories about how Gal and RK and chains and blah blah blah all factor into his impure and overly extravagant gaits?
I mean, really.
I wanna teach my ponies that! SO COOL!
It really doesn’t look anything alike…
Canterbury Court - I think you need to go back under your rock… aka TOB.
I am totally a lurker, but I am so sick of seeing that video. It is a PERFORMANCE video! there are people clapping their hands, he is wearing wraps, there are NO JUDGES! so let’s not compare apples to oranges. If he does it in a proper test, then yes, make a comment about how wrong it is. but the horse is UP, he is excited, and he is allowed to be.
I am going back to the barn…
I have taught horses Spanish trot. It does not require RK or chains or surgical tubing. I do not live under a rock. Personally I love high school movements. Spanish trot or walk can be very useful in helping a horse extend their shoulders more fully. Totalis’s trot today is different than his trot was 2 years ago.
I have no intention to be insulting to Mr Gal or Totalis and his owners. Perhaps the question should have been addressed to the dressage judges out there - how do you differentiate front end elevation in trot work from the Spanish trot? Is the distinction important?
I know that occassionally posters will carp at one another but I am actually interested in this as a legitamate topic. I would be thrilled to have bred, owned or even see Totalis in the flesh. Taking apart an incredible horse’s performance can be helpful in figuring out what we need to do as breeders and trainers to acheive the same success.
The spanish trot horse’s hind legs swing out behind him and he hollows his back a bit.
Totilas sits gets round and those hindlegs have serious air underneath his body. He is an incredible horse.
I saw no similarity.
Totilas is a freak of nature. A beautiful freak of nature.
At a recent interview , Gal said that T can produce a ‘show trot’ which the breeders like to see, but it’s hard on the horse and so he does not do much at home. He does differentiate this from the competition work. The Jan vid of a Kuering (in wraps ) is a presentation put on for those very breeders, so you can’t say that this is the only trot he has, or that the trot of itself has ‘changed’. Gal’s riding in competition has changed over the (few) years since those first Inter vids where he held him in a rigid headset which produced the flinging fores, but here in the UK we were able to see them live 3 times last year, (I was able to see them live twice and 3 times on tv, all recorded and saved). Each time we’ve seen an easing of the neck and less flinging, more ‘normal’ competition trot. Personally I’d like to see a lot more easing of the neck, but the progress and strengthening over the year has been obvious. And to the good. If you look at the KPWN side of his breeding, way back (before WW2) the dutch did experiment with Hackney input, and then Saddlebred as they did not like the Hackney temperement, for that very high knee and flamboyant fore action, which can still be seen in the gelderlander and harness horse sections. While this can be exaggerated with training(and …um…“training”), the bred-in trait is still there, and could be said to be ‘natural’ to an individual horse if ridden in a certain way.
"If you look at the KPWN side of his breeding, way back (before WW2) the dutch did experiment with Hackney input, and then Saddlebred as they did not like the Hackney temperement, for that very high knee and flamboyant fore action, which can still be seen in the gelderlander and harness horse sections. While this can be exaggerated with training(and …um…“training”), the bred-in trait is still there, and could be said to be ‘natural’ to an individual horse if ridden in a certain way. "
While it is true that there has been some Saddlebred and Hackney influence in the dutch HARNESS horses, the riding type and harness type are very very very rarely cross-bred, so Totilas or all other dutch dressage horses have NO saddlebred or hackney blood(I repeat NO saddlebred or hackney blood).
Totilas is a mix of trakehner and jumping bloodlines.
Why is it that people see knee action and assume it must have hackney or saddlebred blood? Maybe, just maybe the same way the saddlebreds were selectively bred to move a certain way, the modern dressage horses are selectively bred to move a certain way.
Rollykurry Whinge du Jour.
Bwahahahaha!
Heck, the horse is excited, the crowd is roaring and clapping.
It’s not Rocket Surgery!
[QUOTE=Canterbury Court;4707277]
I have taught horses Spanish trot. It does not require RK or chains or surgical tubing. I do not live under a rock. Personally I love high school movements. Spanish trot or walk can be very useful in helping a horse extend their shoulders more fully. Totalis’s trot today is different than his trot was 2 years ago.
I have no intention to be insulting to Mr Gal or Totalis and his owners. Perhaps the question should have been addressed to the dressage judges out there - how do you differentiate front end elevation in trot work from the Spanish trot? Is the distinction important?
I know that occassionally posters will carp at one another but I am actually interested in this as a legitamate topic. I would be thrilled to have bred, owned or even see Totalis in the flesh. Taking apart an incredible horse’s performance can be helpful in figuring out what we need to do as breeders and trainers to acheive the same success.[/QUOTE]
Yeah, my horse’s trot looks different from two years ago too. It’s amazing what strength can do to improve a horses gaits.
And, as previously stated, the spanish trot and Totilas’s trot are different if you look at the whole picture and not just the front end. Having trained it, you should know that.
oh, SO sorry Zuitek! My mistake…the hackney/sb input was after WW2. What I should have said was that he may have the natural inclination for the high leg action from the Gelderlander/Gronigen ancestry of Lominka, (and not so far back either)
I think that the OP asked a legitimate question, for which I have no answer (other than I can see “lots of knee action” in both cases).
However, WTF is that three-legged canter that the white horse is doing here? I’ve never seen this - it’s awesome.
The only similarity is in the front legs. That’s it. Look at the rest of the horse!
Well, first it is necessary to be able to tell the difference. Second, be able to look into the future a bit, how will the gaits develop. Of course Totilas looks different after more training. They work on that every single day!
It would be more surprising if his trot didn’t develop.
[QUOTE=Canterbury Court;4707052]
I just watched the recent video of Totilas.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dj78ubYSlak
It struck me that his front in passage and extended trot is very similar to a Spanish trot.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iiS-GciTz5E&feature=related
Obvious beauty and talent but I thought the Spanish trot was not allowed in competition. Thoughts?[/QUOTE]
Oh dear! then we’d best not ask you to ride him.:no: :no:
Hmmm! You didn’t notice that he was just a little inactive behind in the pirouette to the right. And the difference between the lengthening at the trot (albeit a bit flamboyant), and passage seems to have been lost on you. Please turn in your judges card. :yes: :yes:
I have a background in saddleseat, and can assure you that Totilas’s trot would NOT win in a saddlebred class. On the other hand, it might place pretty well in Morgan and Arabian pleasure classes.
GIVE ME A BREAK! Anybody can see that he was a fab horse two years ago… he still has basically the same canter two years before, and you can tell that he is relatively new at Grand Prix because of the “late behind” in the changes. He has obv. gotten stronger, hence the “spanish trot” as you so call it. He was an awesome mover before, but now he is def. one of the best movers in the world. Another reason it is not a spanish trot is the hind legs track up just as much as any other FEI GP horse out there, AND his passage/piaffe/collected trot reflect his extentions. Besides, it is a well known fact that spanish walk/trot will mess up a horse’s piaffe, so why would they, especially being europeans, even bother to teach it? He is just an exceptionally wonderful horse that a great rider has a ride on, and a lot of people I know (including me) would give their right arm to ride him!
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