Nick Bowman & Waylon
Sandborn, Indiana
For Nick Bowman, training a Mustang for the Makeover wasn't much different than working with any other horse. It just took a little extra time to get started. His consistency paid off in the end, with Nick and his gelding, Waylon, finishing eighth in the final standings.
Nick signed up for the program along with his son, Ben, who also got a Mustang to work with. "It sounded like a fun deal," says Nick, "something I'd never done."
From the start, Nick and Ben noticed that even though their two Mustangs had very different personalities, neither horse wanted to expend any extra energy. "You'd work harder than they would in the round pen," Nick says.
Waylon started out skittish and had a strong flight instinct. "Once he got over being afraid, I found he was pretty intelligent and willing."
At first, Nick and Ben ponied the horses a couple times a day. After they began to ride the Mustangs, they spent hours out on the trail. They worked a lot on leg cues and speed control to advance the horses' training. By the time the competition rolled around, they each had logged about 50 rides on their Mustangs.
At the show, Nick just asked Waylon to do what he'd trained the horse to do. Even in the middle of the competition pen and with a standing-room-only crowd, the horse relied on his training and did everything Nick asked him to do during the in-hand and saddle portions of the show.
In the end, Nick felt both he and Ben ended up with good, trained horses. The best part of the process was working together, sharing ideas, and solving problems as issues arose, such as Waylon's fear of new things. "It was really a team effort," Nick says.
Asa Pippin & Q
Senoia, Georgia
In the beginning, Asa Pippin didn't feel too sure about his Mustang's prospects. The horse had an obvious fear of humans and didn't want anything to do with him.. "The horse was scared to death," Asa plainly states. "He looked at people as predators."
At the time he got Q, Asa was in the middle of developing his property. Heavy equipment was being used to clear the land for arenas and buildings. "Tractors and trucks were okay with the horse, but the bulldozer would stop and people would get out, and the horse would lose it when he saw them," Asa recalls. Despite Q's issues, Asa was on the Mustang's back within four days of when he began working with Q. Asa kept riding sessions short and positive to build the horse's confidence.
"He was the kind of horse who would hurt himself to get away from something that scared him," Asa explains. "He was a ticking time bomb when I was on his back-I really had to think outside the box all the time. It wasn't all in the arena, either. I did a lot of his training out on the trail. I had to keep his mind busy."
At six weeks, things took a turn for the better after Asa taught Q how to lie down on cue. "That changed something in him," he says.
From that point on, Q decided to trust Asa. Soon the horse's trust of Asa transferred to other people. "He turned out better than I ever expected," the trainer says. "He's always willing to do what I've asked him."
That included roping, shooting off the horse's back, and wading chest-high through the river. Once Asa had the horse's trust, he had the horse. Q learned how to carry himself in a collected frame, do rollbacks and turns, and to perform flying changes of lead.
Asa liked Q so much, he went to Texas with a blank check ready to buy the gelding back. In the competition, Asa and Q were disqualified during the in-hand segment for going off course. No matter to Asa-he believed he had one of the best horses in the Makeover and was determined to keep the gelding..
Now Q is back home with Asa and taking a break. After the intense training required to prepare for the competition, Asa is keeping his Mustang tuned up with just a couple rides a week, and Q is on track to become Asa's demonstration horse for clinics. "He likes living the spoiled life-knowing he'll always have fresh water and where the next meal is coming from," says Asa.
Matt Gable & Sancho
Mooresville, North Carolina
Matt Gable describes his Mustang as "one tough nut." Not that the gelding was a bad horse-just challenging. He had a strong fear and flight instinct and had a hard time learning to trust people. When saddled, he showed he had a good buck, too.
In the end, Matt decided 100 days just wasn't enough time to get Sancho ready for the competition. It wasn't fair to rush the horse, who just needed more time. It also wouldn't be right to present him to the public as a trained and finished horse, which he wasn't.
"He was the flightiest horse I've ever worked with," says Matt. "We had to go through the regentling process every morning for six weeks. But when we slowed down, we could make progress."
Sancho learned all of the groundwork basics, including shoulders over, hips over, obstacles, and trailer loading. Matt focused on calming exercises to earn the horse's trust. Matt could also saddle and sit on the gelding, although Sancho never actually got to the point of being saddle broke. For Sancho's part, the gelding never acted aggressive-just nervous.
Like the other trainers involved in the Makeover, Matt found that his Mustang bonded strongly to him. To help the horse transfer his trust of humans, Matt's wife, Jessica, spent time with Sancho, too.
Although Matt and Sancho didn't compete in the finals, Matt felt he learned some valuable lessons from working with the gelding.
"He was what I needed at the time," he says. "He made us reevaluate what we were doing. With a lot of gentle horses, we can skip steps and cut corners, but it creates problems down the road. With Sancho, you couldn't do that."
