Specialty Disciplines

There's the fury of rodeo, the cool efficiency of cow work, the measured elegance of the show pen. And then there's everything else: the disciplines that fit none of those boxes, the ones people always describe by what they are not. Not quite this, not exactly that. Welcome to the land of Specialty Disciplines, the freest and most unexpected corner of all western competition.

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The first thing that strikes you here is how far apart they are. At one end of the spectrum, a horse tracing its figures in a cathedral-like silence, heir to a tradition that came over from the Old World. At the other, a rider opening fire at full gallop, the crack of black powder splitting the air. In between, a horse calmly walking across a bridge or through a river, another racing the clock through an obstacle course, and yet another decked out in silver and color until it is transformed into a living tableau. You'd be hard-pressed to find disciplines more different from one another. And yet they all share a common root.

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Every one of them was born of a refusal: the refusal to fit the existing mold. Where the major branches of western competition took shape slowly, layer upon layer, around cattle and the ranch, these disciplines often bear the stamp of a singular vision, sometimes one man's determination to bring into being something that didn't yet exist. Some cross western riding with an equestrian tradition from abroad, others with a firearm, others with the landscape itself. Several are barely twenty years old, proof that the West is still inventing itself right before our eyes, a far cry from the frozen image of a world that only looks back at its past.

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This series leads you down a corridor of disciplines that look nothing alike, opening one door at a time. It teaches you to read them, to understand where each one comes from, what it truly asks of the horse and of the rider, and what makes it impossible to mistake for any other. None of them can be summed up in a single sentence, and that's exactly where their charm lies: each one is a world of its own.

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Seven doors, seven worlds. Open the first one.

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✦ This series is part of a larger undertaking: several themes are being explored at once, with research and writing always underway. New articles are added regularly, so come back and take a look. To keep up with everything new, head to The Gazette, which gathers the latest updates, or sign up for the newsletter to get them delivered straight to you.