Do you have a particular mindset or temperament about your roping? I promise that certain thoughts can really hurt your performance.
Ever heard a guy say that he never ropes well with his wife? Or a father say that he ropes worse for his son than anybody? The potential negative mindsets you can adopt are endless. Here are some more: I never rope well at this arena; I can’t catch steers that go to the right fence; this box is hard for me to leave clean; I can’t catch draggers; my number’s too high... Should I go on?
Also, be careful of what actually comes out of your mouth, such as… “This horse is costing me,” or “my partner is costing me,” or “I can’t win on this type of cattle.”
I understand if you missed five steers that went to the fence, or five steers that got heavy, your tendency is to tell yourself you “can’t.” But you need to be so careful about what you think when you’re roping. Whatever phrase is running through your head – it doesn’t have to be that way. Turn it around.
If you’re the wife who’s always nervous roping for your husband, instead think, “I’m roping with my husband! We get to rope together a lot so we have the advantage of knowing each other’s style and we’ll win a lot together. We’ll just work our way through this until we get that first big win behind us and then we’ll really get to rolling.”
It’s the same with your horse – put pressure and intimidation on him and he won’t perform well. If you reprimand your horse really hard, he’ll become intimidated and the fear factor interferes, whereas if you’re kind and forgiving to a horse that makes a mistake, you’ll build his confidence up. Do you want him to try his heart out for you or shrink down in fear?
Matt Tyler never ran too many on a horse or reprimanded one too much for mistakes – he was always encouraging and petting on a horse. Matt could take a horse that would not work for another guy and just go to another level. Horses would score better, run flatter and harder and work better for him than the other guy.
What if you try all of the above and still have a terrible practice? You can get around that in your mind, too. I’ve actually won a lot of money when I haven’t been confident. You need to learn how to win when you’re doubting yourself; when you’re not riding your horse very good; when you’re not executing things very good and when you’re second-guessing yourself.
Just talk yourself into believing you can succeed; into believing you can rope those kinds of steers, with that partner, in those conditions. Change the way you think about the situation and follow that up with what you say, what you think and what you believe in your heart.
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