Pictures from Expo

The adoption

Well, It's the day after the adoption and we are still a little sad. Princess went for $1650 and we only had $1500. It's o.k. though, we don't need another horse and I think she went to good home. A lady bought her and she will be this lady's first horse. The lady has grown kids so I'm sure Princess will be spoiled a little bit! And she is coming home with us for a little while to be boarded with us. We finested 10th and won $100. I also was awarded the Sportsmanship award by the other trainers and received $500 for that! That was so neat it meant so much to me that the other trainers thought that much of me. We will be heading home tonight after a very long weekend. Thanks all for coming along with us on our journey. I will try to keep this blog going for awhile.

The Finals@

Kevin and Princess finished 12th last night our of 28 and made the top 10. They are sitting in eighth place right now. Finals at 10:00 a.m

Round 2

Sorry the video isn't very good. I was trying to watch Kevin's performance without looking through the lense.

Wow, what a shock!

We got the results from last nights competion and I couldn't believe it we were in first place!Princess scored a 51pts. out of 60, and that was the highest score. We place 2nd, in In-hand trail, so with the two combined we were in first. I couldn't believe it.No stress here going into tonights competion. We had three trail obstacles to do and then a figure eight at the canter. Most of this we did with out a problem. Princess wouldn't pick up the leads I asked for so it wasn't as smooth as I would have liked. We then had a 2 minute freestyle. It didn't go as planned, but after looking at the video, it wasn't as bad as I thought. At midnight tonight they post the top ten going to the finals. We will wait until the morning to find out if we make it.
Dino did the Extreme Cowboy race today. It went pretty well, but I don't know if we'll make it to the finals on Sunday. We had one obstacle that we blew. It was a set of panels in the shape of a C that you had to back through. It was so narrow Dino barely fit in it. We had a lot of fun though. I will try to post the videos.

IN-HAND TRAIL

1St day at Expo

Well we got here at 7:00 a.m. and got Princess and Dino settled in. I rode Princess for a little while and she did really good. Then we got a number painted on her butt for the adoption. She is number 25. We had along wait until the 6:00 PM IN-hand trail coarse. We had a 3:00 p.m. trainers meeting and I got a big surprise! BLM presented Dino with a blanket for High Point Senior Mustang for the Mustang buckle series last year. It was a great honor and very neat that they presented it in front of all the other trainers.
We got Princess ready and headed over to the arena for our trail coarse. We were selected to go 23 out of 28 horses, so we had a long wait. Lisa got to watch all the horses go before us. Princess and I went in and did our thing and I was disappointed that we had one bobble. We had to load in a horse trailer that had cow manure in it and she didn't like it. She JUMPED in on the second try. The rest of the coarse went well. When I came out of the arena I had one trainer shake my hand and tell me it was flawless and another trainer who went behind me came out and said mine go was GREAT! Then Lisa came down and told me that most of the horses didn't load in the trailer very well. So I guess we did pretty good! It felt great. Lisa got a video of it, but it's almost 11:00 so we will upload it tomorrow.

We are on our Way

We are leaving for Expo this morning. I will try to blog while I am there. I don't know about pictures, we'll try. We are as ready as we hoped to be so wish us luck.

PICTURES BY MOLLYDILLPHOTOGRAPHY.COM

I am a Mustang

WELL IT'S JUST 4 DAYS AWAY!!!

Princess has come so far I am just amazed with her progress. This is a recent video of her practicing lead changes. We are so excited about the Expo our nerves are really kicking in. This is a Video of me practicing trailer loading with Dino for the Extreme Cowboy race. We ride on Friday the 20th at noon. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YXSmsy3HfhU

It's snowing here again!

Saturday I took Princess and Dino to the beach again. I have only been able to ride Princess once a week as the fairgrounds has had OSET there all month. I don't get home till after dark so I just have the weekends. Now that the clocks have changed I will have daylight when I get home.
I rode Princess first and she was quite nervous. I don't know why. She kept looking behind her and prancing. So our ride wasn't that good.
Then I rode Dino and we had a wonderful ride. We did figure eights and rollbacks on the beach. He really was enjoying himself. I guess I can't expect to have two great rides all the time. Then I took him through the dunes and was cantering down a little hill. I felt his back end go out from under him a little bit. I think it was his stiffle muscle. The chiropractor said he was very stiff in that area.
Sunday I took Princess and Dino to the ABRA show in Albany to do 1 trail class with both of them. Dino was still stiff so I decided not to ride him. Princess did fairly well in her first trail class, but she was acting nervous again. I then took her in open trail as I wasn't riding Dino. She was really nervous this time and wouldn't hardly do any opsticals. She was nervous about the crowd and a big orange caution sign. She couldn't wait to get out of the arena and was charging out the gate. I made her stop and she reared UP!!! I don't know what has gotten into her. I guess I am going to ride without spurs for awhile and see if that helps. I have been telling Lisa all along that I have been waiting for her to hit a wall (so to speak) and now she has and of coarse it's the week before Expo. Well, what are yah going to do? The best you can I guess.

Princess and Kevin in the BLM Newsletter!

For immediate release: March 6, 2009

ATTN MEDIA OUTLETS: Great human interest story; lots of opportunity for trainer interviews before, during, and after the event...call for more information, or if you'd like to meet/contact a trainer in your area!



NORTHWEST EXTREME MUSTANG MAKEOVER HEADED TO ALBANY

HINES, Oregon – With only two weeks to go, trainers participating in the Northwest Extreme Mustang Makeover in Albany are putting the final touches on their once-wild Oregon mustangs.

The Northwest event is a spin-off of the highly successful Extreme Mustang Makeover held first in Texas in 2007. The Mustang Heritage Foundation, a
501(c) 3 nonprofit organization, in cooperation with the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), created the Extreme Mustang Makeover events in order to recognize and highlight the value of Mustangs through a national training competition.

McMinnville, Oregon trainer Kevin Sink said, “We might get our show ring canter slowed down and work on side passing, but other than that, Princess
and I are really ready to go.” Having a once-wild mustang show-ring ready
in just three months is something to be proud of.

Sink, along with 30 other Oregon and Washington trainers picked up their “to-be-tamed” horses at BLM’s Wild Horse Corral Facility in Hines the first weekend in December 2008. From there, it is a race to the finish: who can best train and show their randomly selected mustang at Oregon’s first Extreme Mustang Makeover Challenge.

Sink admitted, “I was a little worried in the beginning because Princess was a kicker. But she is fantastic these days – she follows me everywhere.”

These events give the public a unique opportunity to see the results of wild horses becoming trained mounts, and to display the beauty, versatility and trainability of the rugged horses that roam freely on public lands throughout the West.

Mustang Makeover trainers will gather March 19 to 21, 2009 at the Linn County Fair and Expo Center in Albany as one of the opening events for the Annual Northwest Horse Show and Expo.

· On March 19 at 6:00 p.m., the Oregon mustangs will be on competitive
display. Trainers are evaluated on the body condition of their mustangs, as well as their ability to handle the horse "in hand" through a series of maneuvers including picking up the horse’s feet, maneuvering it through obstacles and loading it into a trailer.

· On Friday, March 20 at 7:00 p.m. trainers mount their animals and
complete a "horse course" that includes a series of obstacles and requires the trainer to demonstrate the level of competency the horse has accomplished.

· The top ten finalists compete in a freestyle event on Saturday, March
21 at 10:00 a.m -- just one hour before the awards presentation and competitive bid adoption for the trained mustangs.

Sink said, “Bottom line, I want Princess to go to a good home. If at all possible, I want to bring her back home with me!”

For more information on the Northwest Extreme Mustang Makeover, call the Burns District BLM Office at (541) 573-4400. Additional information about the Wild Horse program is also available online at:
www.blm.gov/or/districts/burns/wildhorse/index.php

About the BLM:

The BLM manages more land – 256 million acres – than any other Federal agency. This land, known as the National System of Public Lands, is primarily located in 12 Western states, including Alaska. The Bureau, with a budget of about $1 billion, also administers 700 million acres of sub-surface mineral estate throughout the nation. The BLM’s multiple-use mission is to sustain the health and productivity of the public lands for the use and enjoyment of present and future generations. The Bureau accomplishes this by managing such activities as outdoor recreation, livestock grazing, mineral development, and energy production, and by conserving natural, historical, cultural, and other resources on public lands.

Wild horses and burros are managed in Oregon in accordance with the Wild Free Roaming Horse and Burro Act of 1971. This act gave the Bureau of Land Management the responsibility to protect wild horses and burros while ensuring their populations are managed to maintain or restore a thriving ecological balance.


Submitted photos: 1) Kevin Sink and Princess during their first meeting at Sink's "Stormy Ranch", and 2) Sink and Princess taking a stroll on the Oregon coast in January

(See attached file: Kevin_Princess_Day1.jpg)(See attached file:
Kevin_Princess_Week6_Beach.jpg)







tara

_____________________

Tara Martinak
Burns District BLM
Public Affairs Specialist
Volunteer Coordinator
541-573-4519
_____________________

Expo weekend schedule March 19th-22nd

The Mustang Makeover begins on Thursday night at 5 pm. Tickets are only available at the gate and are $10 each.

Friday, Sat, and Sunday tickets are $10 in advance at coastal farm and garden and $12
at the gate or try contacting Linn Co. Fair & Expo Center at 800-858-2005 where they'll hold your tickets until you get there.

In addition to the Extreme Mustang Makeover, Craig Cameron's Extreme Cowboy Race will also be kicking off it's preliminary round on Thursday night. The ECR will begin at 4 pm in the Silverlite Arena, followed by the In Hand competition with the mustangs. Kevin and Dino will be riding Friday at noon in the Extreme Cowboy Race.

Makeover horse riding course (trail)will be on Friday night, at 7:00 p.m.
At 10:00a.m. on Saturday the finals will start following with the adoptions of the EMM horses.

In addition, Kevin will be riding Dino with the Kiger Mesteno association. Times are Friday 5:00 p.m. Saturday 2:30 p.m. and Sunday at 2:00 p.m.

Photobucket Album

Figure eights

We took Princess and Dino to Debbies arena yesterday. They were having another Expo practice and Lisa is riding a friends horse in the PWHC mustang demo at Expo. Lisa rode Dino for awhile and she was amazed at how different it felt riding him after his Chirpractic adjustment. She said he was so light and supple. Princess also was different to ride she was smoother, not so choppy. We had a great ride and Princess is learning her leads. We did figure eights and changed leads often. She doesn't like to take her right lead and is choppier that was. She is coming a long great though.

http://s38.photobucket.com/albums/e127/stormyranch/Princess/