Buck Brannaman (Day 2) Clinic Hayden, Colorado

It was going to be interesting to see if all the colt starters had done their homework and they did look pretty good as they lead their horses into the arena. Buck was warming up his horse first thing. He talked about how he was looking for ’weightlessness’ as he was working. It was quiet and precise, the way he worked. Disengaging the hind end, moving the front over, backing up just seeking the moment when there was no weight and he instantly quit.

I’ve got my binoculars with me and I am zooming in on every move. I don’t know how anyone could see the finer details and understand when the quit was valid without being close up. That’s why the 7 Clinics DVDs are so good. I shall certainly be studying these in even more depth on my return home.

Buck doesn’t massage people’s egos. He tells everyone he teaches them as if they could be the next Ray Hunt, why tell someone they’re doing good when they aren’t? They’ll never get better.

One participant said she had struggled for an hour to get her horse to accept the bridle.

Buck replied: ’I hope you don’t think I’m impressed with one hour. I’ve spent two days bridling a horse 1500 times before it works.’

He’s direct, I like that. These people want to be horseman? Then they need to know the work involved. Buck will tell them if he thinks what they’re doing is p*** poor but he also throws out the odd compliment…’but bask in your glory now ’cos I’ll be telling you something else later!’ and he laughs. He’s a good teacher I like his commitment to telling people how is really is just like he does with the horses. Both are in no doubt as to whether they’ve got the answer or not.

He made a few choice comments:
Don’t spend all your time getting ready to get ready, get on with it.
I’m not going to be easy on you guys because your safety’s at stake.
If I could get my students to spend less time on ’Wastebook’ and more time with horses they’d have a stable full of bridle horses.

I’ve watched a lot of horse clinics and horsemen and I can tell you that h’s the only person I’ve seen whose feet are the horse’s feet. he just moves those feet like they were there own. It’s smooth and you never feel a wince or a jar as you watch him work. His timing is fantastic, glad I’ve got my binoculars.

In the afternoon because the sun was out the Horsemanship 1 Clinic was outside and everyone was working on disengaging then following through with the front. The rider’s feet had to operate so that they spoke to each foot deliberately placing each one within the movement and this is a pretty fast manoeuvre.

It was chaotic at first.

I’ve done this exercise so I could empathise with their struggles but over a couple of hours it began to look for fluid as the horse and rider began to dance together.

Buck explained it so well in so many different ways it became obvious why most horsemanship can look ’lumpy’ and uncoordinated. You need to move WITH the horse and he needs to MOVE with you.

Look for the tiny things and fix them.

Buck told us that Ray Hunt was always saying to him:
Do less sooner, then you won’t need to do more later.
Me and my binoculars are beginning to see that now.

First day of our Buck Brannaman Clinic today.

It started at 9am indoors and we really had no idea what to expect. Having watched the 7 Clinics DVDs many times I had a few questions and was hoping we would find the answers by watching Buck work in person.The day was split into two parts. The morning was Colt Starting the afternoon Horsemanship 1. The colts were all shapes and sizes with handlers of varying ability so Buck had his work cut out keeping everyone moving forward. First he made sure everyone could move their horse’s feet and retain a safety bubble that the horse would respect. He gave a nice demonstration of teaching a horse where the boundary was and commented that you have to learn how much to do that says STOP!  You have to mean it but not by being mean to the horse. You are not creating any movement by fear but directing the horse first by feel then use the flag if he isn’t ready to feel of you yet.

He then had everyone saddle up and I have to confess I expected fireworks but they did well under Buck’s guidance . Then the handlers took their horse’s halters off and whole group ran as a herd while Buck kept them on the move from his own horse.

After about half an hour he was moving the horses calmly around the arena and the owners were able to catch up their own colts and continue with some groundwork.

Buck gave everyone homework, they had to practice flexion, backing up, picking the rider up from the fence, lower the head and put the bridle on. And they had to practice because, as he said, he would know in the morning if they hadn’t! He was very honest and direct and I really enjoyed his style of teaching.

After lunch was the Horsemanship 1 class. There were 27 in the group but everyone stayed out of each other’s way as they did serpentines and half circles constantly visiting lateral flexion and talking about keeping the horse’ inside the rectangle’.

As he worked he said that ’Everything I do with a horse is incremental that’s why I’m successful with them.’ In other words he tried never to overwhelm the horse and give him too much to think about. There were two ladies there from California who had seen Buck – The Movie and loved it so much they had flown over to watch him work.

The funny thing is neither of them even had a horse!!

Hi from Denver Colorado! Yes We’ve arrived at long last.

The journey was no worse than you’d expect from sitting with your knees nearly under your chin for ten hours. I watched Skyfall (the new James Bond movie), not quite how it should be seen but it was a diversion for a couple of hours!
The descent into Denver was pretty dramatic with our excellent pilot banking round thunderstorms. As we looked out of the windows we could see each thunder storm separately as if on a TV weather map with lightening zapping through leaden black clouds. It was a wow moment. Our luggage was late being unloaded because it was too dangerous for the handlers to go out onto the tarmac to rescue our bags but there was no rush because it took AGES to get through passport control. I suppose everyone is being extra careful after the Boston bombings, so no complaints but it was 4am our time (though 8pm in Denver) so we were pretty exhausted. I loved a sign (non illuminated fortunately) that directed people to the ’Tornado Shelter’ this is certainly going to be an interesting trip!
We picked up our hire car and Philip had decided to do an upgrade. What he failed to realise is that when Americans upgrade it is a bit of a SUPERSIZE compared to little old England and we’ve got a HUGE white stretch limousine with eight seats. It’s so brash and obvious we just fell about laughing as we struggled through torrential rain to the Marriot Airport hotel from where I’m writing this. Everyone will think we’re film stars!
Off to Steamboat Springs today to see Buck Brannaman over the weekend. I’ll post some more later. Just wanted to say high from this HUGE country, I am so excited about being here and looking forward to meeting everyone soon.