Why were you successful in the 2021 Futurity?
Having a successful futurity horse is a multi-step process. With Frostycated, my wife, Amy, and I had trained and rode both of her parents. We knew what some of her tendencies would be before she was started.
The foundation that Rodney Yost puts on our young horses when he starts them is one of the steps. When we get young horses back from him they’re ready for Amy to go right to work on.
Amy is the next step and most likely the biggest key to my success. She’s been training successful barrel futurity horses most of her life. She knows how to get them to hunt a turn. To me, the turns are what make or break most runs.
There’s no set amount of time that Amy will put on one before turning them over to me, but when that happens, they’ll go right into gun training and more shooting pattern work.
The next step is to make sure to not overdo it. Young horses can easily have their confidence wrecked by pushing too hard or working them to the point that they become body sore and begin to resent the job at hand. This is one of the more difficult steps because with young horses, as it is hard to tell if it’s a training issue, or physical soreness if things aren’t going right.
What advice would you give to future competitors?
My advice to Futurity riders is to work with your horse to try to get them to peak at the right time. When you go to make those runs, just do you.
Make the runs that you and your horse are confident with. Looking around and worrying about who your competition is and how fast they are going will most likely lead to failure.
