{"id":118743,"date":"2014-07-31T19:35:59","date_gmt":"2014-08-01T01:35:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/event-tames-wild-horses-using-whisper-techniques\/"},"modified":"2014-07-31T19:35:59","modified_gmt":"2014-08-01T01:35:59","slug":"event-tames-wild-horses-using-whisper-techniques","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/event-tames-wild-horses-using-whisper-techniques\/","title":{"rendered":"Event tames wild horses using whisper techniques"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Russell
Russell Beatty, a nationally known rodeo champion and horse trainer, hosts the Colt Starting Challenge USA Friday and Saturday at the Montezuma County Fair.<\/span>Courtesy photo<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Think you know horses? Can you saddle break a wild horse and ride one in 3\u00bd hours using horse whispering techniques?<\/p>\n

That is the nature of the Colt Starting Challenge USA, a new event taking place Friday and Saturday at the Montezuma County Fair.<\/p>\n

Russell Beatty is a nationally known horse trainer who runs the show with his wife, Cristy.<\/p>\n

Six contestants will test their mettle taming horses they have never seen all while the Beattys give a play-by-play breakdown of their progress.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is not a bronc-riding event,\u201d Russell Beatty says. \u201cIf you get bucked off, you did not prepare the horse properly. You\u2019ll lose points for that. It\u2019s about successful communication technique and gaining the trust of the horse so it is solid and calm.\u201d<\/p>\n

Area horse owners provide their unruly steeds and pay $200 for the rapid-training technique by contestants.<\/p>\n

On Friday, competitors have two one-hour sessions for training, using natural horsemanship techniques. Then on Saturday, the big hoo-rah unfolds when they saddle up and ride the horses for the first time through an obstacle course.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe audience loves it, and the horse owners learn a lot because every step of the way is being explained to them,\u201d Cristy Beatty says.<\/p>\n

The contestants are horse trainers themselves, trying to make a name for themselves, Russell Beatty said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf they do well, people talk about it. If they do poorly, that word gets around as well,\u201d he said. \u201cI interview each one and tell them don\u2019t enter if you have only broke one or two horses because it could go poorly and give you a bad image.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Cortez event is part of a national competition with the finals to be held in Las Vegas during the Wrangler National Finals Rodeo Fan Fest in December.<\/p>\n

The Beattys host 20 colt-starting events per year.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe got started because rodeos were getting kind of old and the national horse-breaking competitions were only allowing big names to enter,\u201d Russell Beatty said. \u201cWe have more of an open contestant format.\u201d<\/p>\n

Russell Beatty has hosted and participated in 50 horse-breaking events.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were just two horses I was not able to break and ride. One was a wild BLM horse,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He was raised near San Antonio, Texas. He competed in rodeo and attended college in Sheridan, Wyo., on a rodeo scholarship studying ranch management. He competed in rodeo until he was 42.<\/p>\n

\u201cI first attended a colt-starting challenge put on by a top-rated horse clinician,\u201d he said. \u201cI was intrigued and amazed by what I saw. The trainers\u2019 methods simplified and sped up the process of gentling a horse.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Friday, the training goes from 9 a.m. to noon in the outdoor arena. On Saturday, the contestants ride the horses for the first time and guide them through the obstacle course while being judged. Tickets are $5.<\/p>\n

jmimiaga@cortezjournal.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Competition is rapid horse training with a gentle touch<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":118744,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6328,6313],"tags":[937],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-118743","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports-2-more-sports","category-sports-2","tag-rodeo"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118743","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=118743"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118743\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/118744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=118743"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=118743"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=118743"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=118743"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}