When you’re building your practice program, be conscious of how many steers you can comfortably rope and continue roping. Especially if you’re really focusing on roping a bunch, whether at home or at someone else’s arena – take care of your body.
Sure, you can rope 75 head the first day, but you’ll be so sore and fatigued the next day that your rope will feel terrible. It would be like if Michael Jordan had worked out with weights so hard that his arm felt like a noodle on the day of the big game. Not smart.
People who work hard at roping need to figure out how many cattle or how many throws at the sawhorse their arm can take. You want to create good muscle memory, and that’s hard to do once your body is fatigued.
If you wear out your arm, pretty soon you won’t be swinging or delivering correctly. And that’s the last thing you want from your practice. To preserve good muscle memory while practicing, make a plan. For instance, decide tomorrow that you’ll rope on the ground for 30 minutes, rope the sled for 30 minutes, and spend no more than one hour on live cattle. Or maybe it’s 15 minutes, 15 minutes and 30 minutes.
When we used to host camps in Arizona, we’d start at 8 a.m. or even 9 and go all day. On the first day, the students were gung ho. By the third day, they were like, ‘We’re doing this all day again?’ I never got sore keeping those kinds of hours, because the more you do it, the better shape you’re in. But it takes years to get to that point.
Even if you’re there strictly for lessons over a week’s time and you want to get the most out of your week, be careful. Sometimes you want to just give it a good couple of hours and call it a day. Leave your arm alone a little bit.
Also, when developing a practice program, don’t just consider your physical status. People who are very analytical and try very hard shouldn’t set aside a long, intensive period of practice over several weeks because they’ll get in their own face and self-destruct.
Here’s another tip for practice – train yourself to conduct a little analysis every time you arrive at the stripping chute. Re-run the action. Ask yourself, ‘How did I break from the box? Did I get my rope up early enough? Did I move my horse over?’
And finally, remember to keep a rein on your emotions in the practice arena. When have you ever seen Clay O’Brien Cooper throw his head in disgust? He doesn’t, and neither does Trevor Brazile, because he’s learned that tying yourself to the whipping post is not beneficial at all.
Instead, think your purest thoughts and focus on what it takes to make a perfect run. That’s just smart roping.
Visit my web site, smartroping.com, for more.