From the Judge’s Chair

FROM THE PRESIDENT

Corey Cushing, NRCHA President

When I think of cow horse, I always think of teamwork. It takes two to compete—you and your horse—it takes a team to make things work at home, at the barn, and to put our shows together. As we come into our most celebrated event, the National Reined Cow Horse Association Snaffle Bit Futurity®, I want to give credit to everyone supporting a team and to riders building their horses into confident teammates.

When we talk about our Futurity horses, or any horses we compete on for reined cow horse, we talk about wanting them to be on our team. As trainers, we work to build confidence in those horses that they can trust us and go where we ask. It is even more important with our 3-year-old competitors that we become a team.

Then, there is the team working behind us and next to us to not only keep our horses looking great, feeling great and riding great, but that also help us keep going every day. Assistants, spouses, children, horse owners, friends and family all make up the team that helps make a smooth day, whether working home or at a show. I can’t tell you how often my wife, Kristen, pulls out her phone to video a horse to show me what it is looking like—it sounds so small, but she is part of the team helping build me and that horse into a confident pair.

Before and at the show, our team grows to include our peers and our cow horse comrades. Yes, we are all competing against each other, but we are on the same team—cow horse. We know the struggles of training and working hard to reach our goals, and that heartbreak if the cow draw doesn’t help us get our horse shown. It’s not only the other riders in there rooting you on, but everyone in the stands and our NRCHA staff and officials. They work hard to be certain our team has a great facility, great cattle and great dirt so that we have the best shot possible to be a champion.

Our team is growing as we all saw at The Run For A Million. The Cowboy Invitational, presented by XIT Ranch, saw cowboys become cow horse competitors, and we were right there with them. Some may have been white knuckled before they headed into that pen, and we all know what that feels like. Did you see our professionals at the back gate offering help? It’s because we are on the same team and want cow horse to be the best it can be, on any stage.

That brings me to our newest arena to showcase how great team cow horse can be: The American Performance Horseman at The American Rodeo. Our sponsors, like Teton Ridge, are giving so much support to our sport because they see that our team is strong. We lift each other up, help each other out and are there for each other, whether it is to celebrate the next Snaffle Bit Futurity Champion or to give a pat on the back when the cows weren’t in our favor. One thing I know for sure, I am team cow horse, all the way.

Corey Cushing

FROM THE JUDGE’S CHAIR

There are quite a few big money races for 3-year-old racehorse, but none have the prestige of the Kentucky Derby.That’s the race all the big breeders, trainers, owners and jockeys want to win the most.It’s the same with the National Cutting Horse Association Futurity, the National Reining Horse Association Futurity, and our own National Reined Cow Horse Association Snaffle Bit Futurity®.It showcases how good the horses are, how well they are prepared and exhibited, and, hopefully, theyhave a little luck by drawing a good, workable cow for the fence work.

It wasn’t long ago that the Snaffle Bit Futurity was for horses that weren’t quite talented enough for the cutting or reining futurities, but maybe blue collar enough to run one at a high speed down the fence.As the competition and prize money increased in the cow horse, people started breeding and raising horses with the Snaffle Bit Futurity as the goal.Owners and trainers from other disciplines jumped in and gave it a try only to find out how hard it is to win—most threw in the towel after finding out how difficult it is! Some have stayed the course, and everyone has benefited.

The judges for our events have evolved as well.Twenty years ago, I started as the NRCHA Director of Judges. My first duty was to design a score sheet for the cow work. Up until that time the judge would watch the work and give a score that they thought the horse earned.The problem with that method was things were missed and opinions sometimes were not based on what actually happened during the work.So, I took a cutting horse score sheet and applied different headings for the score boxes that fit our event and presented it to the NRCHA Judges Committee. Some headings worked well and some needed to be tweaked a little until it fit our event like the score sheet is used today.

Correctly used, the cow work score sheet will describe what happened in the run and back up the judge’s score. One of the biggest challenges while developing the score sheet was to be able to watch and get a feel for the run while it was happening, and at the same time, mark the penalties and a few important boxes.When the run is completed, the remaining boxes should be filled out then added up for the final score.

The score sheet and the cow draw on the fence work make our event unique and transparent.One year when the Snaffle Bit Futurity was at Reno, Nevada, I was walking along the concourse before joining the judges and this nice, older lady in a wheel chair stopped me and asked if she could tell me something. I said sure, and then she said, “I really like this event.” I asked her what she liked

PRIMO MORALES

about it? “Well, if your horse has a good work, you get a good score, if he has a poor work, you get a not-so-good score,” she said. I thought that pretty much sums it up, it doesn’t matter who you are or what your horse is, if you have a good work, you get a good score. How fair is that!?

You can have confidence that the team of judges will be prepared and ready to go.Remember, we’re all going the same way, we just have different paths in the success of the Snaffle Bit Futurity.

GOOD LUCK!

Until Next Time, Bill Enk NRCHA Director of Judges