Skip to content

Learning to rope a goal for four South Cariboo women

Ranch riding competitions gaining in popularity in Canada
31096668_web1_221124-OMH-Ranch-Riding-Roping-_1
Kristen Mozel gives pointers on how to rope. (Fiona Grisswell photo - 100 Mile Free Press)

Cold toes are not enough to stop four South Cariboo women from learning how to rope.

Cat Armitage, Amanda Harvey, Lori Spencer and Jeannie Owen braved the cold November air on Sunday morning to learn the intricacies of roping.

The four women and instructor Kristen Mozel ranged in a loose circle around a collection of traffic pylons and hay bales mocked up to resemble cows.

Laughter and comments echoed through the arena as ropes sailed through the air.

At one point, someone laughed, calling out “Don’t rope yourself!”

Owen has been roping for years. The challenge for her is she is left-handed and is trying to relearn the art using her right hand.

“This is the first time I’ve swung a rope right-handed. I’m left-handed. I’ve done it for years left-handed. And now doing it right-handed is completely different.”

For competing in team roping you rope right-handed as the left hand is doing other things.

“So this is a learning curve,” she laughed.

Katie Wakefield of Free Style Farm is the host of the roping clinic.

The purpose behind the clinic is training for ranch riding shows, an equestrian sport that is new to the 100 Mile House area she said.

Ranch roping is part of ranch riding and competitors need to be able to rope a dummy through a trail course.

“So now everybody has to learn to rope off their horse. So we’ll learn to rope on the ground then we’ll bring their horses in and they’ll learn to rope the dummy off their horses,” she said.

Wakefield said they are planning a ranch riding show for June 3 and 4 this summer and hopes to see the four women compete.

Armitage judges a wide variety of horse events across BC such as Mountain Trail where a horse and rider need to navigate a series of trail obstacles.

“I’m here to learn a bit more about roping because at some point we might use it in the Mountain Trail. Also they’re using it a bit in the ranch riding. When I first started judging ranch riding they didn’t have it but now you see it more. So I thought I should come and I should learn and I should practice.”

She said not knowing how to rope and understanding how it is done is not fair to the competitor if she is judging.

Mozel comes from a working ranch background. While she has a varied career in the horse world, her focus right now is competitive ranch riding, a sport she said is growing in popularity in Canada.

“The more people we can get on board and get showing, the bigger it is going to get. We’ll get more judges, better shows, better quality of horses for it and the riders to match up to that,” she said. “We would really like to put a dummy roping obstacle in our ranch trail show and so the best way to make that successful for people that are going to show there is to teach people how to do it.”

Harvey has been riding her whole life. Her son is a bull rider and introduced her to roping - she said she wants to get better so she can keep up with him.

The biggest challenge so far in the clinic is coiling the rope back up.

“I can catch it, I just can’t coil it back up. I have some work to do there,” she laughed, saying she will have to wait and see how much she improves before deciding if she will enter the show.

“I don’t know if I will be ready by then but I’ll keep practicing, we’ve all got to have goals.”

Out of the four women Spencer is the only one who attended the clinic with the goal of competing in the ranch riding show.

“They include a lot of roping classes, sometimes you just have to drag stuff with a rope, sometimes you have to rope it and then drag it. All about getting your horse used to it so I have to learn how to rope so I don’t hit him in the head,”she said. “He is used to it and so we’re getting some finesse now on how to catch things.”

She said it just takes some practice and having someone telling you the right way to do it.

“Anyone else that joined us, that would be awesome. The more the merrier.”

This is the first in a series following these four women in their journey to become ropers.



fiona.grisswell@100milefreepress.net

Like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter

31096668_web1_221124-OMH-Ranch-Riding-Roping-_2
Cat Armitage concentrates on what she is doing. (Fiona Grisswell photo - 100 Mile Free Press)
31096668_web1_221124-OMH-Ranch-Riding-Roping-_3
Jeannie Owen (from back) and Amanda Harvey practice their technique. (Fiona Grisswell photo - 100 Mile Free Press)
31096668_web1_221124-OMH-Ranch-Riding-Roping-_5
Lori Spencer prepares to rope her “cow”. (Fiona Grisswell photo - 100 Mile Free Press)


Fiona Grisswell

About the Author: Fiona Grisswell

I graduated from the Writing and New Media Program at the College of New Caledonia in Prince George in 2004.
Read more