Road To The Horse

We arrived home late last night from a whirlwind tour of Tennessee as well as a visit to Kentucky, with our wonderful friends Sherri & Mark. The purpose of our trip was to attend the Road To The Horse colt starting event featuring 3 world reknown trainers; Clinton Anderson, Chris Cox, and Pat Parelli. It was an honor to be in the company of these giants in the industry, as well as Stacy Westfall; the only woman to participate and win in 2006. You may have seen Stacey's much talked about You Tube video of her competing and winning a reining event without a saddle or bridle. She is one inspiring young lady.

Because of my recent experience with Dexter, I was watching this event with an eye open for any ideas that might help me along with him. What I did take away was that my grasp on natural horsemanship training will indeed serve Dexter well.

Pat Parelli made a huge mistake (his own admission), by misreading his horse and getting bucked off. While nobody wants to see anyone get hurt, it was good for the audience to see that even professionals make mistakes and go on to learn from them. We were also not impressed by his obvious disregard for safety. At one point he sat on the top rail of the ring but his horse was not ready for this and pulled the rope out of his hands a couple of times, accomplishing nothing. His next step was to stand up on a teetering barrel set away from the rail and ask his horse to come between him and the rail. If that horse had pulled him fast, Parelli would have hit the dirt again. It was disappointing to me that kids in the audience who admire him would try these things at home.

Clinton Anderson was his usual confident, personable self throughout the entire event. Clinton's free style run at the end of his ride was awe inspiring and brought the crowd to their feet, many with tears in their eyes, as he slipped the briddle off and rode full gallop around the arena, cracking his stock whip the entire run.

Of course we were cheering for Clinton but it was a really tough call between he and Chris Cox. I have never seen much of Pat Parelli's work but must admit to being extremely disappointed in, not only his work with the horse but his apparent lack of regard for his fans. One day he announced he would sign autographs at 12:20 and didn't bother to show up until 1:20, while his frustrated fans stood in long lines waiting to meet him.

Chris Cox won the competition, and is the only 3 time champion and in fact has won every time he has participated.

It was a long way to go but worth every mile to be able to attend such a great event.

I feel even more inspired to help Dexter along and can't wait to see him again.

While we were in Tennessee, we rented horses at Juro Stables.

Carla was our host and took us on a beautiful ride through the Tennessee hills. Spring was barely starting to erupt so the birds were singing and the area was sublimely tranquil. I thoroughly enjoyed visiting with Carla. Our horses walked out faster than the others so we often had to stop to let the others catch up. My observation of these horses is that they have been desensitized so well that they are literally bomb proof. The flip side is that they have not been sensitized and can be unresponsive to leg or rein cues. These horses are taught to follow the leader so cuing is not as important. My horse Stormy had a complete disregard for the shank bit in his mouth so without turning him, I had not brakes and no back up. While it was somewhat frustrating at times, I can appreciate that these horses keep beginners, who are apt to give conflicting cues, very safe. Well done Carla!

Tovie, Gord, Sherri & Mark

PS: The B-B-Q in Tennesssee was great . . . .