My Man Sam...American Horsewoman's Challenge Entry Video and Comments

Many of you have read Davalee’s blog, “The Horse Woman’s Challenge - 9 Steps to Entering and Being Chosen to Compete.” In it she gives some insight on the preparation and the making of our entry video. After reading about the process of making the video, many of you have shown interest in seeing it. So in this blog we have not only attached the video link, but I will also give you some of my thoughts and feelings about the process.

First of all the whole thing was very challenging and fun for me. We were given specific instructions for what the judges wanted to see from us, in the three separate disciplines that the Horse Woman’s Challenge encompasses (Liberty, Cowboy Dressage, Trail). Liberty, by far, was my most challenging. 

As many of you who have trained with MM Training know, our motto has always been “do the minimum on the ground to get the maximum in the saddle.” So though I do believe we have a solid ground program, Liberty takes it to another level. Sam had the basics that we put on all our horses. He was connected, he would turn, face and come on command in the radius the size of a round pen. He would move away from pressure. I could influence his behavior because he’d accept correction and reward. Plus, he would lead without a halter. But as you will see in the video, I had to put a few more buttons on Sam for this portion of the competition. I think we did pretty well, considering the time we had to pull it all together. I only had a little over a month for training time. 

The next two portions of the video were more in line with my past experiences. The Cowboy Dressage portion required a lot of precision, which we do a lot of in the MM Training Program. The only thing I feel we could have done better in this portion, was our free walk. Free walk means Sam is supposed to drop his head and neck and extend his stride. As you will see on the video, Sam is too flexed while we are doing the free walk on the diagonal reverse. Besides that inaccuracy, I was pretty pleased with our performance in the Cowboy Dressage. But the Trail portion I wasn’t so pleased with.

The requirements for the Trail portion were more like requirements for a reining horse. Besides two trail obstacles (jump, bridge), the rest was more about showing what kind of handle we had on our horses. Sam has a really good handle on him. He has beautiful lead changes, spins and stops. But because of his injury we weren’t able to shine in these areas. I was worried about Sam, and Sam was worried about himself. So we did the best we could with the cards we were dealt that day. And thank goodness, it must have been good enough! We got selected!!!

Overall, I’m pleased with how the video came together, thanks to Kori, Davalee and Jessica. It was a team project and these gals rock!!! Sam and I couldn’t have done it without them! I love their enthusiasm, their expertise, and their toughness!

In closing, I would again like to thank everyone on our “Black Stretch Limo” team. All of our clients have been so supportive and encouraging. It’s been a very fun journey so far. Please keep following Stretch’s progress. I will be posting weekly updates on this blog. And for more insight on all the other competitors in the HWC competition, go to www.horsewomanschallenge.com and click on “join the remuda.”