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 Warrior Mom
Posts: 4400
 
| I'll try to make this short, I have a 8 yr old amazing head/heel horse, he's big and somewhat butt high, actually really butt high lol! He's jam up in the roping pen and I bought him as a finished roping horse.. he only knew his left lead.. was never loped on his right lead. After I burnt out on roping I decided it was time to try and pattern him. I taught him to use both leads and got him loping nice circles in both directions and teaching flying changes. . (Still working on that) I'm not even loping the pattern on him yet, I want to get him correct first... so just trotting the barrels and getting him to lift his shoulder and really bend thru the ribcage. .. which to the right he's spot on, nice and soft and bendy.. to the left, we are struggling .. he likes to drop shoulder and just kinda try and freight train to the left.. I'm just kinda looking for some suggestions from those of you that took a die hard rope horse and successfully patterned them. What kind of drills did you do? Like I said our right turn and circles to the right are darn near perfect and feel great, to the left, not so much... I do have him going to the right barrel first and have wondered if I should switch ... tia! | |
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 Veteran
Posts: 110
| I love to work on funneling with mine, because it teaches him to be mindful of where his feet are going and enforces rate. Counter arcs are also great for softening them up and teaching where to place their rib cage. I would probably switch him if you think that it would help him shut the clock off, but not because of his turns, he should be great both ways. Just be patient, work on a few drills and he will get there. This website is also pretty good for finding stuff to work on http://www.trainingbarrelhorses.com/ | |
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Regular
Posts: 85
| I did this exact same thing a few years ago. My horse turned out to be a really nice barrel horse and we won a lot BUT he had a little quirk that I had to do every time I ran. Just like you are explaining, if I didn't drive drive drive him into him turns, he would drop his shoulder and just kind of flop around them. After a lot of work, I realized that I really needed to load him unto his hind end going into a turn. I would slow work him throughout the week doing normal drills, keeping his shoulder up etc. The MAIN thing I had to do with this horse was make sure after I turned the first barrel that I had his shoulder set for the 2nd, and same with the 3rd. He didn't like much pressure on the bridle so it was more of a "set your hand and leave him alone" type of thing. After setting my hand I had to drive him into the turns and up underneath himself with my core and feet. When I got to my spot I had to sit deep (he was very strong and would leave you coming out of the turn) and that would keep his hind end underneath himself setting up a really pretty turn.
I would say the hardest thing about him was trusting him to drive that hard into a turn. He was a big strong hard running horse so it took a lot of T-I-M-E for me to trust him. Once I could trust him it was game on and we had a lot of fun.
I hope this helped some!! Good Luck with your boy! This was my head horse turned barrel horse :)
Edited by Lph88311 2016-07-29 2:13 PM
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Warrior Mom
Posts: 4400
| Thank you! Honestly when you look at my horse, conformation wise, you wouldn't think he could be very athletic... he's butt high and toes in slightly on the front left. He's so extremely laid back, almost lazy in the warm up pen... and then BOOM he's all business behind a steer lol! And soon as we rope, he's back to his lazy self... I can't help but wonder if he'd stay that way as a barrel horse. I trust him completely while running down a steer and he has a very natural rate, we have our "spot" all figured out. With him being butt high when I'm just loping around he feels like a broken rocking horse lol, it's almost uncomfortable but when we rope I don't even notice it all.. I'm super excited to do this with him and I'm in no rush at all, I don't even own a barrel saddle anymore so I'm just doing this in my roping saddle for now. | |
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 Extreme Veteran
Posts: 368
Location: Ellensburg, Washington | I am trying to do this right now with my husbands head horse. His big thing is all he has ever really had to do with his feet is get them in the right way to go left. It is a whole different ballgame getting his big body and feet all gathered up for the turn. He is a work in progress. I found that doing Paul Humphrey's drills have helped a ton to get his hip under him, etc. | |
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