US Patent 9387588 Handling gait disturbances with asynchronous timing

An example method may include i) detecting a disturbance to a gait of a robot, where the gait includes a swing state and a step down state, the swing state including a target swing trajectory for a foot of the robot, and where the target swing trajectory includes a beginning and an end; and ii) based on the detected disturbance, causing the foot of the robot to enter the step down state before the foot reaches the end of the target swing trajectory.