Well, a big part of it is trying to look the part. You know, the whole poser thing.
There was an impeccably dressed gal at a Buck clinic, riding in the afternoon H2 class that involved working cows and roping. Ideally, the horses should have been in a bosal, but many of them weren’t ready for that, so the majority were in snaffles. A few were in a two rein, one was in the bridle. You were expected to be in the equipment suited to your horse’s training.
Anyway, after about two days of watching Ms. Beautifully Outfitted struggle, not even being able to steer her horse straight over a 10 inch log on the ground (a good 20 feet wide), Buck told her she had absolutely NO business in a hackamore. And further, she needed to watch the morning class and get busy with THOSE exercises, as she was not able to do much of anything in the afternoon class. Which, by the way, were things like leg yield, haunches in, and a flying change over the jump.
If you ever go to a Buck clinic, ride in clean, well fitting and appropriate clothes and tack.
It is helpful to have slobber straps and a mecate rein, because you can learn to use them. You might never show with them, but there is a progression, and learning how to use them puts a pretty big ballast in your toolbox. (It took about two years for me to not have everything in a useless tangle. But now, I am glad to have them.)
And the rope…if you never rope a cow, you can again get a lot of horse-training usefulness if you go about learning to handle one. At the very least, you can go about getting your horse good with dragging a lot, and having the rope here and there around his body.
Again, it will take a while but once you have a basic ability, you can get a lot of things done that have nothing to do with the ability to rope cattle.
Same with the flag, by the way. I would be terribly embarrassed if I were at a horse show or event, warmed up without my coat, and my horse couldn’t handle to have someone hand me my coat without freaking out. Like, that is NOT a safe horse to be on to me, much less out of the round pen and in public!
If you are Buck, or Reata or Buck’s apprentice Isaac, you’re going to have to be ready for something extracurricular during the clinic. So having rope, chinks, knife in your belt, flag tucked away somewhere close, is what you need to be prepared. Sort of like being properly dressed to foxhunt if you’re a whip- you’ve got couplers (I think that’s the right term?) for errant hounds, wire cutters, and other accoutrement.
But yeah, some of those folks are the real deal, who DO dress that way so they can be fully prepared, even in an indoor arena. Others are learning, others are posers, and some have other equestrian pursuits involving breeches or spandex, so they have a different outfit.
But Aaron Vale rides in a mecate, lead rein tucked into his breeches, when he’s at a Buck clinic, if I recall correctly!
It is great to mow in though, it is indeed very shady.
