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SHIFTING GEARS YOU PICK: CUTTER OR CAN CHASER? BY FIELD EDITOR, CHRISTINE HAMILTON South Dakotan Lea Stodart came to the 2008 AQHA World Championship Show to compete in barrels. And she brought her cutting mare, Flip To Docs Daisy. “Daisy” is cutting bred and trained but has found a calling running barrels. “My husband, Craig, and I, when we first got married we decided that we wanted to raise some horses,” Lea said. “I went and looked at this horse called Flipmia. “I thought, man, here’s the whole picture: he’ll rope; he’ll run barrels; he’ll be able to do it all,” she continued. “He was already a trained cutter. I brought him home and loped him for a week and entered a cutting just for fun, and the first day, I lost five cows. The next day, I won it.” Lea also bought Daisy, a daughter of her new stallion, who had also been trained to cut. Lea showed her a little and put some National Cutting Horse Association earnings on her. “I thought, now that she’s earned some money, I’ll try to sell her,” Lea said. “Because I bought her as a money-making prospect. But I could not give her away.” Lea put Daisy on barrels, and she started earning 2D money. Once again, she tried to sell her with no luck. They thought she was cute, but too little. “Then finally one day, she jumped up and outran everyone at 4D,” Lea said. “It was a really tough 4D with some pros there. And they walked up to me (afterward) and tried to buy her, and I thought, you know, she’s not for sale anymore. And she’s not!” At the 2007 World Show, Lea qualified Flipmia in amateur cutting and Daisy in amateur barrels. “Last year, I had a goal – I so wanted to get both of them in the finals, a sire and daughter in two completely different disciplines,” Lea said. “But it didn’t happen; I lost a cow (in the cutting).” Lea and Daisy ended up fourth in the 2007 amateur barrels. And on the first day of 2008 World Show competition, November 7, they qualified for the senior barrels finals – they’ll run in the amateur prelims on November 8. Lea grew up the daughter of a rodeo stock contractor. “I’ve ridden a lot more number branded horses than I have ranch branded,” she said. She and Craig own and operate C Hanging C Performance Horses in Edgemont, South Dakota. “We’re raising and riding colts, and selling what we raise,” she said. “I’m just really fortunate that I’m winning on what I raise.”
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