Know the Pro: Katie Dove

KNOW THE PRO

Katie Dove’s uncalculated path brought her to reined cow horse the long way around.

By Larri Jo Starkey

All her life, Katie Dove wanted a pony.

“I’m the only one in my family who has loved horses,” Dove said, with a laugh. “You know, the typical horse-crazy girl that dreams of a black Pegasus, flying horses, and getting a pony for Christmas on the porch.”

Dove’s parents weren’t connected to horses; however, her father’s transfer from California to Texas when she was 10 years old moved her closer to her dream.

“I was just convinced that meant I was going to get a horse, because every kid in Texas must ride a horse to school,” she recalled. “It didn’t happen.”

Dove took the long way around to reined cow horse, and there were few signs along the way that she would become a trainer for Shenandoah Bar M Ranch in Midland, Texas.

“When I was 15, my parents got me 10 riding lessons at an English farm for Christmas,” Dove recalled. “That’s where I started riding, but they weren’t going to pay for more. So, I went out and found Sally Fisher, an all-around trainer who was looking for someone to feed and clean stalls in exchange for riding lessons.”

Finding a way to make things happen is a consistent theme in Dove’s equestrian career. Every day, she fed horses and cleaned stalls in the mornings, then took riding lessons in the afternoons. The pattern continued until she left home for college at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, Texas. Once at college, she still did not have a horse, so she joined the equestrian team.

One day during her freshman year, Dove saw an ad for a Thoroughbred mare priced at $1,000. Without thinking twice, she laid down money earned working at a bar.

“The mare was turned out with a bunch of cows on cattle feed and had a goiter,” Dove said. “She was 17.2 hands, not really broke, but she had Jockey Club papers. So, I bought her. I took lessons from Kathleen O’Shea at Blarney Stone Equestrian Center, a hunter-jumper barn in Lubbock, and continued working at the bar. That paid for board.”

Dove won jumper of the year on the mare, but for her second horse she chose something just a little bit shorter. Her boyfriend at the time, Trey Dove, had a tie-down roping horse he allowed her to borrow to ride. Within a month, the pair was jumping and entering events.

“We just ran fast and jumped high,” Dove said. “He was either going to go and win it—we were blazing fast—or sometimes he would do a calf rope style stop refusal and send me rocketing over the top.”

A man who will let someone jump his calf horse is a man worth keeping, Dove reasoned, and the couple married and moved to Midland. Dove had a master’s degree by that time, and she started teaching. She also started team roping with her husband and father-in-law. From there, she competed in Stock Horse of Texas and American Quarter Horse Association ranch riding and ranch versatility. With success in SHTX and AQHA, Dove found reined cow horse and was ready to compete in the National Reined Cow Horse Association.

She taught math and science during the school year then started horses in the summers using techniques she had learned from watching clinician Clinton Anderson and other trainers. Her big break came in 2012 when Troy Martin at Shenandoah Bar M Ranch gave her the opportunity to train and manage his horse operation.

Dove’s experience teaching and experience in a wide variety of equestrian disciplines came together once she had customers to train. She was able to show client horses herself and coach the owners to ride them.

Step by step, Dove was figuring out what she wanted to do with horses.

HIGH COTTON PHOTOGRAPHY

Katie Dove worked her way into reined cow horse through other disciplines.

Reined Cow Horse News: So, how did you get into cow horse?

Katie Dove: I had been training and showing Stock Horse of Texas, AQHA ranch riding and AQHA Versatility Ranch Horse with success. I found the most exciting aspect of this were the cattle classes, and I was eager to get to the next level in my training and showing career with NRCHA. I was training a stallion named Doc Seas Whiskey, who was really talented, so I just dove right in and entered the Snaffle Bit Futurity®. I was in awe of the amount of talent of both trainers and horses at that level. We had a lot of fun, and though we didn’t win, we showed pretty well. I knew then that I for sure wanted to continue to learn everything I could and become an NRCHA cow horse trainer.

RCHN: Besides Sally Fisher, which trainers have helped you the most?

KD: There are really too many to list. I have learned so much from just sitting and watching trainers at shows and working on what I was seeing. Even before I really got into showing NRCHA, Shawn Hays came up to me at the AQHA World Show and said, “Hi, that’s a really nice horse.” He was talking about Sister Sour Mash, and I was like, “Oh, my gosh, Shawn Hays is talking to me!” Shawn has always been a big help and I am still seeking his guidance a lot these days.

Everyone has always been very welcoming and helpful. Being fortunate to show in Texas with so many top trainers, you get little bits of advice here and there and I always welcome it. Jay McLaughlin has really been a friend and willing to tell me what I need to do or work on. I have been blessed to be able to learn a lot from Robert Chown over the years. He was gracious enough to let me ride and coach me the week before the 2021 [American Paint Horse Association] World Show. It was much of what we worked on that helped me win the APHA world championship in senior working cow horse that year.

Q A

with NRCHA Pro Katie Dove KD: Really a lot of balance and seat. Being comfortable going a little faster with an element of danger. Being able to go fast and make good decisions on the fly.

RCHN: Did you intend to become a trainer?

KD: My first degree is in animal science. I didn’t know what I wanted to do, but I always knew it would be with horses. My goal was just to be successful with whatever I did. I have always loved training horses, and in 2012 when Troy Martin at Shenandoah Bar M Ranch gave me that opportunity, I felt like that was the path that God was paving for me.

RCHN: When will you be able to say, “I’m a success now?”

KD: I always think that it’s going to be that next trophy or belt buckle, but that’s not it at all. I think I’m more blessed than anything, but for me what makes success is when I come out of the pen feeling confident. When I showed well, and I really rode my best. If I come out and I’m glowing, like I put on a show, that is successful to me. When me and the horse are just clicking, on a big stage or at a local stage, it really doesn’t matter. I just like to do my very best and have fun doing it!

RCHN: What’s an average day like for you?

KD: Being a mother and running most everything at the barn myself, I have to be a multitasker. I have a great group of clients and fit in a lot of lessons. If it’s a homeschool day, [my son] Tucker and I get up and start saddling horses and ride out together. If it’s a cattle work day, he turns back for me. He does his homework in the afternoons, then I’ll give him a riding lesson. In the evenings, we go to karate and jiu jitsu, which I am working hard at myself.

We do a girls’ group here on Saturdays. Many of my riders are 50-plus, and they are all branching out because working with cows is so much fun.

They say, “I’m too old to do that.” And I say, “If you keep on saying it, you will get too old. Just go do it. If you want to do it, just go do it.”

And we’re having fun.

RCHN: What did you bring with you from the hunterjumper world to the cow horse?