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Reining in the Land of the Midnight Sun

Les Vogt teaches performance horsemanship in Alaska

EAGLE RIVER, ALASKA—Nature still has the upper hand in Alaska, where thousands of acres of untouched woodland shelter the wildlife that has retreated from other parts of the world. Here, it's not uncommon to see moose, lynx, mountain goats and even bald eagles—but you might be hard-pressed to find a cowboy.

Alaska's abundance of wide, open space—it's twice the size of Texas and has the lowest population density in the country—is very attractive to horse owners. Keeping up with the latest in performance horsemanship, however, becomes a challenge when most trainers are a couple days' travel away. And because most of the nation's horse shows are out of reach as well, Alaskan riders are rare on most horse show circuits.

That doesn't mean the state has no qualified riders. Les Vogt, 15-time world champion and legendary performance horseman, discovered that a small but talented pocket of reiners populate the "last frontier" when Linda Boggs of the High Valley Ranch invited him to Eagle River, Alaska, to teach a full class of entry- and intermediate-level riders the art and science of performance horsemanship.

"Alaska may not really rhyme with our western way of riding and reining," Les surmises, "but there is much more hidden in the folds of Alaska, as far as talent and good horses go, than we would expect. The interest level is very high, although the high end is probably shallower because there are not many people and because it is relatively new there."

Set on the banks of its namesake, the town of Eagle River lies just north of Anchorage, surrounded by spectacular 360-degree views spanning from Cook Inlet to the west to the Chugach Mountains and their 20,000-year-old glaciers to the east. This idyllic setting remains sunlit 21 hours a day during the summer, providing plenty of time for Les to teach the 15 participants how to set up their horses for high-performance reining maneuvers.
Les' performance horsemanship clinics emphasize the importance of form. "Sometimes we tend to, without education, lean more toward function than form," he explains. "My people learn that any really good—or faulty—maneuver is predicated by the form used to initiate that maneuver."

Les' "form-to-function" approach to horse training revolves around a horse's four basic zones: the head and neck, the shoulders, the ribcage and the hip. A high-performance horseperson, he explains, can will his or her horse to move each of those zones independently or in coordination, at any speed, with no resistance from the horse and no apparent effort on the part of the rider.
Les also teaches his students how to use "positive horsemanship" to get their horses to respond. "I teach negotiation," he explains. "And my definition of good negotiation with a horse is to set it up so that we get what we want, and the horse thinks he gets what he wants."

Many of these skills were new to the Alaskan clinic participants, whose geographic isolation offers few opportunities to expand their training and showing expertise.

Although he does not foresee much Alaskan competition in the "lower 48," Les believes that the skill level seen during his clinic proves the state is capable of sustaining its own successful western riding community. "Alaska has interest, good horses, skilled riders—just not the ability to travel over here and expose themselves to a lot of shows, because it's very expensive," he explains.

Les has traveled the world for the past 30 years, teaching the techniques of high-performance western horsemanship throughout the world, from the bottom of the globe—in such far-flung locales as Brazil and Australia—to the Alaskan wilderness at the top, and everywhere in between. For information about hosting a private clinic in your area, contact Les at (805) 455-0162 or visit his website at www.LesVogt.com.

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