EQUITANA Stacy Westfall Horsemanship Clinic

Stacy Westfall first rode into fame on Whizards Baby Doll (Roxy) at the 2006 Reining Championships in the USA, where she performed freestyle reining on the black mare bridleless and saddleless, to the Tim McGraw song, Live Like You Were Dyin'. Stacy and the lovely Roxy instantly became stars! Even those who weren't fortunate enough to be there for the actual performance, were soon able to watch it over and over on YouTube. Horse people around the world were inspired by the amazing girl and her black mare. 

This afternoon, attendees at Equitana Sydney, were treated to the pleasure of a three hour Stacy Westfall Horsemanship Clinic!

Stacy was riding a borrowed horse, Blaze (a Quarter Horse gelding - registered name Tell Me A Story - owned by Shelley Peters) who she admitted she's ridden for about 5 hours previously (she said she'd ridden Roxy for 1000 hours before that legendary performance in 2006).  Stacy explained the basics of training horses to go bridleless emphasising that it's not something you can just go out and do over night!

She started out wanting to try bridleless by aiming to show her reiners on as pitched rein as possible which meant that she had to instill other cues in her horses so they could perform without relying on contact with their mouth.  For example, amongst her other training and cues, Stacy teaches them to stop and back up with her legs only - legs in front of the girth and bumping. So immediately the legs go forward the horse learns this means stop and then back up if legs stay forward.  I was really impressed with the way Stacy uses this when asking for a lope transition, to prevent the horse running forward she will put her inside leg forward of the girth to encourage the horse to slow down (not rush the transition), while the outside leg is asking for the lead and she encourages the horse to wait for the 'kiss' to lope.  Definitely something I'm going to try with my pleasure horse!

Stacy proceeded to canter, counter canter, change leads, slide stop and perform exercises on Blaze with the reins tied around the horn and using no hands!  Obviously they were not perfect but they were still pretty impressive considering the small amount of time Stacey had ridden Blaze! Stacy used Blazes little imperfections to show the kinds of mistakes horses make and how it's legs, legs and more legs that you need to correct issues. She also emphasised that during training if the horse isn't performing, say in a turn, as it should - pick up on the reins and then reward it with the release as it corrects the body shape.

With the help of other riders on their own horses, who were at different stages of training, Stacy showed the four leaf clover pattern on a set of five cones, four around the outside forming a square and one in the middle.  The riders performed a variety of the same exercise in walk, trot, canter and counter canter and these exercises were obviously a lot harder than they looked.  Stacy calls the four leaf clover exercise an instant riding lesson - perfect for making nervous horses and riders relax and improving overall performance. You can use the exercise on all levels from the very green horses through to finished campaigners and up the degree of difficulty depending on the horses needs.  Stacy demonstrated the four leaf clover exercise with no hands at counter canter. A fantastic accomplishment on a horse that had never done the task until the day before.  Blaze was a champ too and you could see that he was really trying to do what Stacy wanted.

Stacy reinforced that the training theory she lives by is to not ride the same everyday - make you and your horse work - just riding around the same all the time means you will never improve.  Manufacturer ups and downs and don't train in a straight line (ie: the same every day).  Have a training cycle which can be applied monthly, weekly or even in each training session - divide it into Five and ride the first month, week, 15 minutes normally, than make the next month, week or 15 minutes harder, then the next a bit harder again and then by the fourth make it really hard - you and your horse should both be puffed!  Then on the month, week or last section of lesson, make it easier.

There was far more covered in the clinic then mentioned here and I highly recommend that anyone who wants to know more about Stacy's methods buy her training dvds - she certainly is inspirational and seems like a really friendly, down to earth person too.

I'm keen to try several of her tips and the four leaf clover exercise with my horse Teddy when I get home!

Stacy is performing a freestyling reining on Blaze in tonight's program and will be holding more sessions in the demonstration arenas throughout Equitana, so if you missed her today, you could catch her at one of these sessions.  Visit the Equitana site to find out session times.

Well done Equitana for commissioning Stacy to come to Australia!

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by Jo Johnson/Horsezone