EXCA

I volunteered to help with the Extreme Cowboy Association competition hosted at KCRC.  EXCA as it's called is a competition done in western tack and attire.  The riders are timed and go through a series of obstacles.  This particular course had the rider go into a "box" and turn there horse several times clockwise and then counter clockwise.  Then they had to take a rope off a barrel and loop the barrel and ride their horse around it coiling the rope around the barrel. The next obstacle include three 1 foot jumps.  Then a circle that had poles laid out to make the horse trot nicely over the poles in each direction.

The next "obstacle" was a free ride, most people just galloped around the arena and didn't do anything every interesting.  Then they had to drag a pallet so many feet and then rode between two cones doing a stop and turn, run, stop and turn etc.  Next they had to open the gate to get out to the other obstacles.  After that there was a stand that had a pulley which pulled a tarp up in the air.  Many had their horses walk through it with the tarp flapping around!  Then they had to back up a hill and back down a hill.  Next was ground tieing.  They dismounted, ran up a couple of jumps on a little hill and came back to mount their horse.  The final thing was running over a bridge and going back to the gate to close it.

There were several divisions, youth, novice, non-pro and pro.  Some of the higher divisions added the cowboy curtain (noodle thing) into the mix or had slightly more complicated maneuvers to do.  I found it very fun to watch.  I was up in the eagles nest doing the timing for the runs.  Each rider is judged by time but also horsemanship and how well the team does each obstacle.  I could see getting involved in doing stuff like this with Dani at some point.

After the event was done I grabbed Dani from her stall and round penned her for a little bit and then brought her over to the tarp.  I pulled on the pulley and she started as the tarp flapped all around.  When she calmed a bit and licked her lips I let the tarp down.  We repeated this, each time the tarp getting higher and faster.  She became very calm about it and even tried to nibble on it.  I may have to build one of these since the club doesn't own one, it's a great desensitizing obstacle!  We still need to work more on the cowboy curtain.

When I finished my chores and playing with Dani I went to my truck to head home.  Guess where all the flies decided to hang!  The roof of the cab was covered in flies!  

Anyways, it was a long day but I had fun working with other club members and learning about the EXCA.