Diagonal Advanced Placement or DAP.
When learning the foot falls of the equine gait I was always thankful for the simple jog. The nice 2 beat diagonal gait seems to me to be the easiest to comprehend for both the amateur horseman and the more experienced horseman. Counting strides and foot falls mentally is tough and when the horseman progresses to feeling the footfalls rather than counting them, he is well on his way to advanced horsemanship.
For the aspiring horseman I have bad news. The jog is not as simple as we have formerly surmised, nor is it strictly a straight forward 2 beat gait. What if I were to tell you that the diagonal pairs don’t always hit the ground at the same time and when there is disunion of the diagonal pairs the jog can become a 4 beat gait. It’s the pursuit of this disunion that actually improves the horse’s gait making the jog more comfortable to sit.Before you head explodes, let me explain further.
When the hind leg of the diagonal pair touches down before the diagonal foreleg, it is known as positive dissociation or positive DAP.
There is a well documented phenomenon commonly spoken about in the dressage discipline
called Diagonal advanced placement, or DAP, can be found at the trot and canter. The USDF’s Glossary of Judging Terms defines it as being when the “hooves of a diagonal pair of limbs (in trot or canter) do not contact the ground at the same moment.”
The trot has always been thought of as a two beat gait, with the diagonal pairs of legs landing and taking off together (with a moment of suspension between.) However, closer analysis using photography and stop action video has shown that the diagonal pairs do not always land together, resulting in what is referred to as dissociation or DAP. When the hind leg of the diagonal pair touches down before the diagonal foreleg, it is known as positive dissociation or positive DAP. When the foreleg of the diagonal pair touches down before the diagonal hind leg, it is known as negative dissociation or negative DAP.
the diagonal pairs don’t always hit the ground at the same time
A byproduct of a horse developing consistent DAP in the jog or the trot is that it takes some of the impact out of the gait by splitting the concussion of the landing feet between the diagonal pairs taking the jog from a 2 beat gait to a 4 beat gait. A horse with DAP will be easier and more pleasurable to ride at the jog. As work towards building balance and collection in our horses, the DAP should be a natural result.
