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This piece of information was written by Candice Burger, Ms. Burger is answering to the post title "What is Trocha", at American Paso Finos!
I will appreciate dearly NO REPLYS, Ms. Burger is not a member YET of this forum! It wont be fair!
I find this Article and information to be very accurate!
Thanks!
Candice Burger writes:
Ah, did someone say pie??? This is long and a commentary of my thoughts only to be corrected by those who so choose to.
For Finogirl, the trocha is a beautiful fluid movement that has sustaining diagonal supports, which causes a broken rhythm that sounds like a garbled trot. Instead of a very sharp, clear "trat" it is softer as "tras" with one foot slightly behind in the diagonal footfall. To watch it, it can look like a gaiting paso fino that is out of gait. Some say there are no lateral supports but I disagree. If that were true it would be a pure diagonal gait with two beats instead of an uneven 4-beat broken diagonal. It has to have a lateral support to provide the 4-beat cadence. The uneven beat is due to the flight time of a foot in suspension or the amount of time the foot remains on the ground in support.
Generally what you will see, for example, as the left rear lands, the left front leaves the ground, as it nears it's pinnacle of flight, the right rear leaves the ground as well, as left front lands, so does the right rear immediately after it and then begins the right front movement soon after. It gives the appearance of a horse almost in paso gait but having a very distinct diagonal tendency or a horse having weak lateral supports and suspensions. If you watched for paso gait, your eyes would have a hard time discerning any lateral tendencies, but if you look at only one diagonal, you'll see a very distinctive footfall.
Colombians use the term "paso" to describe the trochadors emphasizing it's heritage and the propensity of the gait to lack concussive movements; in other words, it's rather smooth and easy to sit with little jarring. Recall that the term "paso" is about the step. Not about gait, but how the horse moves to perform his step. Pasos are very distinctive in how they move their feet, even in a walk or canter, there are subtleties that make it a paso cantering instead of a QH.
Because the paso fino's heritage comes from horses with diagonal genetics we tend to say a horse is "trocha" that is diagonal in his way of going. If it doesn't have the timing, fluidity, sustaining qualities of trocha then it's not, but simply a horse out of kilter and maybe trotty, maybe pacey, or all of it together.
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The term "pasitrote" came up in a discussion about my stallion when he was at Dave Jone's place for training. The horse was under saddle and as we watched him, we argued his gaiting tendencies. Dave said he was trocha, I said he was paso. Now the horse was trotting beautifully for his trainer. When I rode him, he had the greatest float in his trot, wonderful to sit. I said he was paso because of the way he used himself, particularly his rear when turning, very square.
Dave called it pasitrote and said he would eventually go into paso gait. Whatever it was, he wasn't trocha, but very diagonal and very smooth to ride. I said he was diagonal because he was very stiff in the spine and as soon as he suppled, he'd gait paso fino not trocha. Dave agreed. Dave used the two terms, trocha and pasitrote, interchangeably, but I thought the use confusing and don't use either terms in that sense. I use the term "trocha" to mean a type of gait and the term "pasitrote" is not used at all. I prefer to say a paso that tends to be diagonal or trotty instead. I believe that is the real meaning behind "pasitrote"--a trotty paso fino not trocha.
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Trocha has a very specific definition for a specific type of gait. This term when discussing a paso fino with diagonal tendencies confuses the distinction. I believe the discussion with DJ illustrates the problem and confusion. The horse was obviously not in paso fino nor trocha. Trotty as the dickens though. DJ called it pasitrote, I called it a stiff paso that was trotty or out of gait. We concluded we meant the same thing. Amazing too because we both agreed about the same course of action to get him into paso gait.
This is the problem we have today with the terms. The film TerryW mentioned is not entirely correct with how it describes the trocha gait or pasitrote. However, it does correctly demonstrate trocha or what is called pasitrote. Here the terms are used interchangeably as well. The other problem is the term is also used to describe a horse that is not in paso gait with diagonal tendencies. Unfortunately the definition ends there. What has happened in the USA is we have taken a term that defines a gait to mean an undesired, negative quality of the paso fino breed. This is completely erroneous, which I will explain further.
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I believe the negative aspect of "trocha" what we tend to call diagonal expressions of paso fino gait is steeped in myth. We tend to believe the stories of the naturally gaited jennet horse and how it influenced the heritage of the paso fino breed. We believe the story without first asking what the heck is a jennet, where did it come from and what is this "gait" it expressed? We all tend to believe it was the pure isochronal, symmetrical, 4-beat gait of the paso fino. I don't know what role the Berber and Andalusian played in all of this, but we tend to negate their roles entirely and focus on this gait thing.
The facts are the paso fino developed sometime in the 1800's. Allot of Spanish and N. African horses were imported along with some native stock to DR and PR. Not all of these horses had a paso fino gait. I doubt the paso fino gait as we know it today really existed back then. Recall, many horses of paso fino heritage trace directly back to Spanish Andalusians or to Berbers and many horses of paso fino heritage also paced. So, to reject diagonal or lateral tendencies as "unnatural" goes back to us believing in the paso fino creation mythology of the jennet horse who apparently had great powers to influence all things we call paso fino.
All paso finos have some diagonal and lateral tendencies OR the paso fino could not perform the paso fino gait. What the genetic inheritance is, is still a mystery. Again, all we need to do is look at our own USA breeds to see the same phenomenon. The foxtrotter will have pacey horses, the TWH will be trotty or pacey and the saddlebred is the same.
The truth, as much as we'd like to ignore it, is the paso fino horse has the genetics to trot and pace and anything in between. How it does the in between has obsessed so many that they reject everything else for the isochronal gait. In my opinion, this is unrealistic and quite damaging to the breed. I only need to point to the PPR history to illustrate.
So, with our obsession about paso fino gait, we reject diagonal tendencies and for the lack of understanding what paso is, we call it something else. We call it "trocha" and we say it is a bad thing. No it's not. What's bad is if the horse is diagonal and still out of gait because there are diagonal gaits in the paso fino breed. In Colombia it is developing into a breed of itself, the trochador exhibiting the trocha gait that was/is still a part of the paso heritage, and in Puerto Rico it is called the sobre trote and is part of the PPR paso fino breed. The footfall sequence is the same but the execution is different. However, the point is, paso finos have always demonstrated diagonal gaits. That is until very recent history where our obsession for paso gait and our beliefs steeped in mythology has ignored historical facts.
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If we took the time to glean out fact from fiction, it would become immediately self evident that we have taken only a portion of the breed to focus on. History does have some influence on why this has happened. Why have horse shows throughout the paso fino kingdom that demonstrated the isochronal aspects of the breed only? We are missing a vital piece of information to understand why that happened. When did it become obvious the horse had developed into something distinctively different than its ancestors? Is this why only certain aspects, mainly how it gaited, were demonstrated or shown off? I think so. Also it is interesting how this emphasis seemed to happen not in small parts of the Spanish colonies but appears to have occurred simultaneously suggesting a common interchange in the earliest part of the breed(s) development.
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The unfortunate consequence to all of this is found in this discussion. Gait, gait, gait, gait...not just any gait, but paso fino gait and the intolerance for anything that is not perfectly isochronal. Unfortunate too is the belief that if it is not isochronal then it is not smooth or easy to sit. Again, the fact is very few horses are truly isochronal. Most are not. I'd say 90%+ are not. Again, I believe this is steeped in the mysticism of what paso fino gait is. I remind myself again that "paso" is about step not gait. It is the "how" of gait not gait itself. If pasos developed a plodding, smooth, isochronal 4-beat gait that was droopy and sloppy, I doubt it would have survived.
Something happened to modify a mixture of horses with lateral and diagonal tendencies into a different horse with the tendency to perform isochronally. Yet, at the same time, something else was also developed in how this gait was performed. We tend to attribute this to a mythical horse called the jennet, but I suspect otherwise.
A fine illustration of what paso gait is beyond it's isochronal tendencies is to look at the Colombian trochador and trote y galope horses. A tremendous example of the genetic importance of paso. There is a reason the paso has been used extensively to develop other modalities. Why use Lusitano crosses and the paso criollo? Why not just take some Lusitanos or Andalusians without the paso and get the trodador or trote y galope? Or why not try a TWH with an Andalusian? Purely speculative on my part, but I suspect it has to do with the genetic "purity" that cannot be found anywhere else. Whatever it was the paso fino had to change the expression of how a gait is performed and the genetic commonality between pasos and its ancestors. Also the time in which these crosses occurred where perhaps a positive response happened. Instead of diluting the expression, it was enhanced.
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We need to put the negative connotation about lateral and diagonal tendencies back into the paso fino gait and out of the paso fino breed. The paso fino breed is a mix of trotting and pacing horses along with the genetic inheritance to perform a symmetrical, isochronal gait. It can run, it can trot, it can walk, it can trocha, it can andadura, and it can paso gait. Not all paso fino horses can perform the perfect paso fino gait. Very few can, most come close, but few are truly in a 4-beat gait. We've obsessed about this one trait that we forget it is both the lateral and diagonal aspects PLUS the other genetic parts that make it paso gait to begin with. To get this in one perfect package is saying something.
People constantly grind themselves into pulp worrying about this gait thing. I say if you study the masters of horsemanship, if you choose a horse with sound conformation, if the genes are there, your horse will gait. Expecting a paso horse to be born perfectly in gait, to take your weight and all the contraptions you put on it and gait, and to then expect it to gait a certain way is asking too much. We expect our horses to compensate for everything we do to it and then gait without our assistance of any kind. Quite honestly, when I think about it, I understand fully why only the paso fino gait was emphasized in the show ring. It is a rare instance indeed to own such a horse.
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EDIT
I might add another comment about the notion of "natural". We emphasize the genetic tendency to be perform an isochronic gait by prohibiting any weight or shoeing configuration which may enhance the movement. While in other breeds it is not unusual to see different weighted shoes, different toes or heels on a shoe, and different materials used for shoes, PFHA prohibits such practices. I think this is a good thing, however, it also introduces greater variability in gait expression due to the fact that few horses will be perfectly balanced and isochronal for the entire performance. Our issue with "trocha" has to do with the current tendency for horses to escape the pressures of performance (tired, braced, what have you) and become more diagonal. It wasn't so long ago, they'd get pacey. Either way, the inability to sustain the most isochronal footfall is a fault while in competition. Today, we tend to ignore much about what is paso.
Natural is is what natural does. To me, if we spent less time about getting a horse competitive and more time getting a horse fitted, suppled and balanced, we'd enjoy our horses more. I suspect we'd see less numbers in the show ring too but the quality that did show would be tremendous. Right now, I see allot of average performances by horses that I think are way above average or should be completely removed from competition. Essentially we have lowered our standards to allow more to compete by excusing the average performance saying it is because we have to "save" the horse or the performance. Really what we are doing is protecting our own inadequacies to get the best out of the horse and allowing the horse to continually compensate causing allot of mediocrity. We then say it's ok to be mediocre because pasos are so variable in expression. This confuses the issue when discussing what is gait and how it pertains to the breed.
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