BY CHRISTINE HAMILTON, FIELD EDITOR
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| Peppy Chex Your Gun stands ground-tied in the ranch trail class. The stallion and Terri Cooper of Yuma, Colorado, are the first amateur world champions in versatility ranch horse. |
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| Right to left: Clayt Cooper, AQHA President Frank Merrill, Peppy Chex Your Gun with Blaine and Kail Cooper, Terri Cooper and Fort Dodge representatives Susen Shields and Emilee Hoffner. |
“I’m going to cry!” said Terri Cooper, standing in the Denver Coliseum holding the reins of her sorrel stallion Peppy Chex Your Gun. The two had just made history – winning the amateur division of the inaugural Fort Dodge AQHA Versatility Ranch Horse World Championships at the National Western Stock Show in Denver, Colorado.
“It was a tough class and any of the Top-10 spots could have won it,” Terri said. “It’s an honor.”
For two days they battled it out with 20 other qualifiers, the point lead changing after every class.
“In the versatility, really, it’s never over until it’s over,” she added. “It was tight.”
In versatility ranch horse, exhibitors compete in five classes – ranch cutting, ranch trail, ranch riding, working ranch horse and ranch conformation – and earn points based on their placing in each class. The horse and rider with the most overall points wins. The ranch cutting, ranch trail and ranch riding were held on Wednesday, January 16, 2008, with working ranch horse and ranch conformation on Thursday, January 17.
Holly Major of Fowler, Colorado, riding Love A Little Devil, took the early lead winning the amateur cutting, with Betty Lou Valdez and Little Bell Pepper taking second, and Terri third.
Then Terri and “Peppychex” won the amateur trail with Holly placing third, but Betty Lou finished 11th. In the ranch riding, Holly again won with Betty Lou second and Terri third.
“Yesterday Holly Major and I were bumping back and forth with first place all day long,” Terri continued. “But I knew that Betty Lou’s strong events were the halter and the working cow horse (yet to come.)
“(Peppychex) is a pretty typey Quarter Horse, so the judges either really like him or they don’t. So, everything kind of rested on the halter class.”
And it did. As Terri expected, Betty Lou swept both the working ranch horse and conformation classes, while Holly placed eighth and tenth, respectively. Terri’s second in the working ranch horse and third in the conformation clinched the overall win.
“It’s unbelievable, (any of the exhibitors) could have done it,” Terri said. “He was just the only one that stuck it in the top three in all five classes. Everybody else had a bobble somewhere. He just stayed with me.”
Betty Lou Valdez and Little Bell Pepper ended up winning reserve and Holly Major and Love A Little Devil, third, making another bit of history – the top three were women.
Terri and Peppychex are also competing in the open division.
“When everybody else was doing three classes yesterday, we did six,” Terri pointed out. “And we have four today – he still has two more classes to go in the open. On top of having to compete against the best versatility horses in the world, he was doing double time.”
Terri and her husband, Clayt, live in Otis, Colorado, near Yuma. Terri is a chiropractor and Clayt is a banker, and they have two sons, Blaine, 8, and Kail, 5. They raise ranch horses and stand Peppy Chex Your Gun to the public.
A 2000 stallion by Young Gun and out of La Osas Peppychex by Peppy San Chex, Peppychex was bred by Michael and Victoria Simmons of Parker, Colorado. He is a multiple Top-10 high point finisher in open and amateur versatility ranch horse with a little more than $2,600 in National Reined Cow Horse Association earnings.
“We’ve had him since he was 3,” Terri said. “We bought him for his bloodlines and his personality. His disposition was what really filled the bill for us. We just turn him out with mares, we pull him out and breed and show; he does everything. You just couldn’t ask for a better animal.
“We’ve put five years into this,” she added. “Pretty much dedicated everything to getting this done, traveled a lot. He’s such a phenomenal horse to get me here. I owe it all to him.”
Terri and Clayt got into versatility ranch horse through the Rocky Mountain Quarter Horse Association.
“Specialized showing is neat, but we use our horses every day,” Terri said. “We just needed a horse that could go out and go branding, ride pastures, or come in and show. That’s the kind of horse that we felt the Quarter Horse was about, so we feel that this sport best promotes that.
“Another thing about the versatility is we’re all very competitive,” she continued, “but there’s a camaraderie there. You still need each other to get through the day. Behind the scenes, people borrow each other’s brushes. If someone loses a boot, three of them are thrown at you before you can say you need one. I love the people we compete with.”
For now, Terri has two more classes to think about – tough competition in the open working ranch horse and open conformation.
“In the open my goal was to stay in the Top-10, and we’re sitting in there solid,” Terri said with a smile. “So, I’m just going to cruise tonight.”
She’s already got a gold trophy.
