Dear Roper,
I feel like I might need to explain myself: I got carried away. That happens from time to time, and I’m guessing—if you read this magazine and this column with any regularity—you can tell when this occurs.
During this issue’s production, things were nuts around here. We did double-duty in shipping our Arizona Guide and our regular issue at once, and I was in the thick of video editing for Roping.com and preparing for the Sept. 1 launch of BreakawayRoping.com. So, naturally… I distracted myself from all I had to do and grasped onto what I wanted to do: I talked to guys about their horses because that’s really why I got into this whole game in the first place.
You can find the results of that on page 58–62, where I took a deep dive into how so many of the sport’s great horses are related in “Sibling Rivalry.” I’ve been in the thick of the young horse business so much lately with our coverage of the rope horse futurity business, that these connections and these breeding programs were simply on my mind. I found enough connections, of course, that I held half of them for our November issue, too. (By the way, if you’re into this sort of thing, I’ll be at the American Rope Horse Futurity Association’s World Finals this Oct. 21–23, covering the goings on. So if you can’t make it, check out teamropingjournal.com for our coverage.)
And, if you’re like me and the horses are where you really find your entry point into this great sport, you’ll probably love this other great project we’ve been working on with our parent company, Equine Network LLC. That project is called Horse Week, and it’s a full week of exclusive content we’ve shot and edited with the highest quality crews, documenting the value of the horse to the world at large. Some of our favorites—like Trevor Brazile and Lari Dee Guy—make their way into what you’ll see, too during the program’s premiere, airing Oct. 3–9 on horseweek.tv.
As always, let us know what you think. Shoot me an email at cshaffer@equinenetwork.com, and I’ll do my best to get back with you quickly!
