>>> Am I getting this right? The Icelandic tolt is the same (similar?) to my TWH's rack
Tolt is the Icelandic word for rack, yes. In the past, it possibly (probably?) was a generic word for soft-gait, just as Americans have regionally used such terms as amble or single-foot. >>> but the flying pace is not the same as my Standardbred's hard racetrack pace? I'm not really sure how "hard" the Standardbred's race gait has to be, so I can't address that. However, a flying pace is actually a slightly broken pace, where there is a moment of suspension with all feet off the ground, but also times where there is one foot on the ground. You might say that it's between a hard pace (with a hard pace meaning a pure, two-beat pace) and a rack/tolt. Some of us believe that it's almost impossible to tell a "speed rack" from a "flying pace", at least at times. When the legs are moving THAT fast, no one's eyes are quick enough to see exactly what's happening. Judy has even posted some studies done at the McPhail institute where special, high-speed cameras studied "tolt" and found that even "tolt" tends to morph into a pacy version. Do you have Lee Ziegler's book or did you ever get to meet her, either in person or through the internet? She had some great ways of explaining gaits - as being a continuum where one gait morphs into another. I like those terms. In this context, I think there's a point where "tolt" morphs into pace, and somewhere in that grey area lies speed rack and flying pace...at least that's how I see it. Karen Karen Thomas
