Showing
Tennessee Walking Horses are known for their ambling gaits: the running walk, the flat walk, and for their gentle, "rocking horse" canter. Although many members of the breed can perform other gaits, including the trot, fox trot, rack, stepping pace, and single foot, these gaits are typically penalized in breed shows since they are not considered "correct" gaits for a Tennessee Walking Horse. The running walk is the most famous gait, with speeds from 10–20 km/h (6-12 mph). As the speed increases, the horse's rear foot overstrides the front print 15–45 cm (6–18 in). The greater the overstride, the better a "walker" the horse is said to be. The horse nods its head in both the running and the flat walk, the ears swinging with the gait. Some Walkers click their teeth with the gait.
The two main categories of competition are performance horses and flat shod, differentiated primarily by the size and weight of the shoes being worn.
- Flat-shod horses are divided into trail, country, light shod, and plantation pleasure divisions. They are judged on way of going, which includes head nod, overstride and front animation. The country and trail pleasure classes have the least animation, the plantation horses the most, with the plantation horses typically wearing a heavier shoe. Flat-shod horses are not allowed to use pads, action devices, or tail braces.
- Performance horses exhibit a very flashy and animated running walk, often referred to as "big lick." They appear to sit back on their hindquarters, lifting their forelegs high off the ground with each step. Horses and riders show in saddle seat attire and tack. Horses are shod in double and triple-nailed pads. These pads, along with lightweight chains around the fetlock, accentuate the gaits, making them more animated.
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Famous quotes containing the word showing:
“We owe to genius always the same debt, of lifting the curtain from the common, and showing us that divinities are sitting disguised in the seeming gang of gypsies and peddlars.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Every man has his moral backside which he refrains from showing unless he has to and keeps covered as long as possible with the trousers of decorum.”
—G.C. (Georg Christoph)
“Female Virtues are of a Domestick turn. The Family is the proper Province for Private Women to Shine in. If they must be showing their Zeal for the Publick, let it not be against those who are perhaps of the same Family, or at least of the same Religion or Nation, but against those who are the open, professed, undoubted Enemies of their Faith, Liberty, and Country.”
—Joseph Addison (1672–1719)