The trot-gallop transition is the point at which a horse switches from a trotting gait to a galloping gait. It occurs at the maximum frequency of the horse’s stride, as the frequency no longer increases once the horse has achieved a gallop (Waring 27) – even if the gallop is the same absolute speed as the trot (Wickler 1989). The speed at which the transition occurs, which is different in every horse, is really more of a range of speeds bounded by the maximum speed the horse can trot without transitioning and the minimum speed it can gallop without transitioning (Wickler 1989).

There is disagreement as to the trigger for the trot-gallop transition; research has shown the transition to happen both at the point of least metabolic cost to the horse and at the point of peak forces on the horse’s musculoskeletal structure.

The former case needs no explanation, as minimizing energetic cost is the reason for many animal behaviors. In the latter case, however, the transition’s occurrence at a point other than an energetically optimal speed could be explained by the fact that the horse does not remain at the transition speed, but instead reaches a more energetically optimal speed in the trot or gait (Taylor 1991). A recent attempt to reconcile the two triggers by Wickler, et al. (2003) posits that both could be triggers, but research methods confound the data.

This website was created as a part of a class project in the Animal Physiology Class at Davidson College.

E-mail me at emmccracken@davidson.edu