“What we judges repeatedly get treated to is a variety of trots that are ‘faking it’ in one way or another,” exclaimed Anne Gribbonsin her Sept. 24 Between Rounds column (p. 126).

“It was interesting to observe at the Olympics that, all the way to the top placings, there were horses who lacked the ability to use their backs in the extended work and who possess almost no elasticity in their gaits or ability to stretch over their topline,” she continued.

Gribbons remembered her training sessions with dressage legend Col. Bengt Ljungquist, in which she endlessly practiced transitions and fluidity by doing transitions to and from the extended gaits.

Norma Pulle, a reader from Soquel, Calif., agreed with Gribbons and wrote a letter encouraging dressage enthusiasts to study the works of dressage master Henry Wynmalen. Here are several excerpts from his book Dressage: A Study of the Finer Points of Riding, originally published in 1953, which help explain how the extended trot should be ridden.

Development Of The Trot

So, before we begin to talk of developing the trot, we assume that the horse is capable of a good, unspoilt working trot. That means a trot with reasonably roomy strides, of even length, in regular tempo and therefore of good rhythm; it means that the head be carried still, in a normal position, neither high nor low, with the nose in front of the vertical, an angle of about 45%.

It implies that he is capable of reasonable variations of speed, within the frame necessary for ordinary, comfortable riding purposes, and that he can be brought back to a walk or a halt gradually, without conscious effort. Obviously, he has a nice, naturally soft and unspoilt mouth, ready to develop into a made, good mouth.

That then is the basis whereon to begin our work.

Our purpose is simple.

It is that of making the range of our horse’s trot infinitely variable, from the maximum of extension to the maximum of collection, with perfect cadence and absolute fluency throughout the range.

By the time we have succeeded in just that, we have succeeded in everything!

We begin by developing the expressiveness of the working trot. We wish to add a degree of brilliance, which means more energy. We begin the easiest way. The easiest way to create increased energy is by the demand of greater speed. But we must be extremely careful. The horse, also, is intent to answer our demands in the easiest way; he finds it easier to quicken rather than to lengthen his strides–and that we wish to avoid at all cost!

So this is how we proceed.

We have our horse nicely settled at his working trot with a soft contact on the mouth. We have got him so far that the regular rhythm of that trot has become a routine; we are able to maintain him at it without effort and with hardly any aids on our part. At his working trot the horse is pleasantly active and light.

We now close our legs gently, just enough to make him accelerate, just enough to do so distinctly but no more. The energy for this acceleration is delivered by a hindleg, which pushes with increased strength from a position behind the vertical. This action can have no other effect than to lengthen the next few strides. But only through the momentary effect of acceleration!

That effect ceases as soon as the horse settles to his increased speed; the increased speed in itself does not really help our purpose; on the contrary it may very well spoil it; it may cause the horse to run fast with short strides, which is a disastrous form. It is for that very reason that we demand only momentary acceleration, which must, as we have seen, produce a few lengthening strides. We demand this acceleration by action of the legs alone, without action by the hands.

But, as soon as we have obtained a few longer strides, the hands receive the horse gently on the bit, the legs cease driving, the horse is brought back quietly to his working trot.

And here, in a nutshell, we have the entire principle for the development of the diagonal gaits, extension, collection, retardation! We extend the stride, we receive the increased energy on the bit (collection), we retard.

It is all so simple. Provided always that we are content with very little at a time, that our aids are light and delicate, that we do not surprise the horse, that we do not startle him, that we do not call forth even the semblance of impetuous or rough reactions, that we do not upset the even rhythm of the pure diagonal gait, that we keep the horse straight.

The horse, meeting his bit gently through the effect of his own impulsion, will begin to flex and bridle, the retardation will bring him back on his hocks, be it ever so slightly to start with. Both effects will gradually lead to collection and to all that this implies–suppleness, balance, lightness, and carriage.

So we work on gradually, as time goes on, along the same lines.

Our first line of progress is again to accelerate a few steps, receive the horse on the bit, before we come back to the working trot.

Gradually, we begin working both ways: Accelerate to lengthen the stride, hold the lengthened stride for a few moments, and come back to just a little slower than a working trot. Soon we shall be able to produce the longer stride, softly on the bit, at a speed no greater than the working trot. We have then achieved the addition of a measure of brilliance through increased impulsion without any further need for increased speed.

By that time the rhythm will have improved and begun to tend towards cadence; the horse’s back will begin to soften and his mouth to become more and more responsive.

Rhythm And Cadence

It is desirable to achieve a fair measure of cadence before risking any considerable variations of pace.

If we demand more than the horse can do, we risk spoiling his rhythm and cadence. If we demand more than the rider can do, we risk spoiling everything. If we proceed within the capacities of both, the horse will assume balance and correct, still-head carriage quite automatically, as the direct consequence of correct movement; and the rider, if he be reasonably gifted and attentive, will perceive and feel the supreme ease and lightness of his own actions.

The fluency of the horse’s mouth, his quiet ease, the comfort of his paces are the rider’s reliable guide; if he fails to read them, the horse will have to resort to clearer language still. If the rider’s hands are not gentle enough, or the reins too short, the horse will protest by his head carriage–too high, too low, or too deep. These are certain signs that the rider is, or has been, at fault.

In the sphere of the sitting trot, he will be able to vary, by frequent extensions and retardations, his actual speed from that of a working trot to that of a very slow trot indeed. But such variations of speed will be of no value unless they lead to ever-increasing accentuation of rhythm and thus, gradually, to cadence.

Now, whilst rhythm is no other than keeping correct time, cadence is keeping time with a purpose, marking the rhythm with great energy, beating the drum as it were.

To transpose rhythm in to cadence the horse has to use great energy all the time, very much greater indeed than the untrained horse would use for comparable speeds. The trained horse delivers the maximum of impulsion all the time, whatever the speed, whatever the movement. But, being trained, he does that easily, without strain, without effort, in perfect lightness. That, precisely, has been the object of all his training!

In working on these extensions and retardations, then, the rider will proceed so gradually that strength of rein is never, and strength of leg hardly ever, required. But he will have to realize that a good slow trot demands a greater degree of impulsion than a faster one. The slower the pace, the more the rider has to concentrate on the maintenance of impulsion.

The Extended Trot

Again, the development of the more extended forms of trot benefits, as all other paces do, from variations of speed with particular attention to the preservation and the gradual improvement of the length of stride. Naturally, the development of collection and of extension proceed more or less simultaneously.

But with one proviso.

A small school is not an ideal place for the practice of extended paces. The straight lines are much too short, and the many turns and corners make it impossible for the horse to persevere for any length of time in the right type of action with the hindlegs.

These legs, to make the horse trot at all, have to deliver a dual type of effect. In the first place they have to throw him upwards, off the ground; this they do from a position near the vertical. In the second place, they have to drive him forward; that they do from a position behind the vertical.

The place for this particular work is in a large school, or the open country, on good going, on long straight lines.

The reader will have noticed that the horse has to assume a long, extended form, that he has to leave the collected shape. This means that he is to be allowed to lower his head and to extend his neck, things he cannot do unless the rider allows him the appropriate length of rein.

That, then, is the rider’s first care.

His second care is the amount of contact he shall allow the horse to take. It follows from the extended form itself that the horse must transfer more of his weight from his quarters on to his forehand.

Consequently, the contact he will take, must, of necessity, be more positive, even though it need never be heavy. So long as the horse urges forward there may be distinct contact, but not weight. Weight will only be felt if the horse surges downward as well as forward. Which, if it occurs, is a certain sign that the rider has either given insufficient rein or else, as often happens, that the rider himself is pulling, even though he may not realize it.

But without positive contact, the rider would not be able to regulate the increase of forward impulsion, which may be very great, into evenly regulated, absolutely equal strides.

And that is of the utmost importance!

The training in extension then has to proceed just as gradually as the training in collection. Only, in a sense, it is even more difficult, because it is so easy to drive the horse beyond his rhythm. And an extended trot without rhythm degenerates just as easily into a valueless “run” as an indifferent collected trot may go to waste in an equally valueless “jog.”

The method, then, is to concentrate on rhythm and on length of stride, relying again a good deal on the effect of momentary accelerations for the production of that length. In that way, progressing methodically, always within the horse’s capabilities for the time being, we are certain to reach the maximum of which the horse can be made capable, in time.

From Dressage: A Study of the Finer Points of Riding, reprinted with permission from Wilshire Book Company, North Hollywood, Calif. (www.mpowers.com).