Nick Coleman is a horseman at heart, but after this latest welding project for an AG class, who knows? Welding just might have to come first, after all.
CHS sophomore may turn from horse training to welding
By Pete Kendall/reporter@trcle.com
February 12, 2010It’s understandably spooky mounting a horse that’s never been ridden.
The rider can’t know exactly what the horse is going to do — smile, frown or say, “If you raise your voice to me one more time, I’ll buck you into Bosque County.”
That’s what almost happened to young horseman Nick Coleman. “At first, I was nervous,” the Cleburne High sophomore said. “When I’d first get on a horse, I’d be holding the saddle horn. But if you do enough ground work on them, they shouldn’t buck. They might, but ground work really pays off.
“I had one last year throw me into a metal pipe fence. The guy who was helping me on the ground let go of the lead rope. My leg wasn’t all the way in the saddle. I came off and flew into a fence. The way Ron [Richmond, boss] and I do it, one of us is on the horse and the other is on the ground with the lead rope. If the horse starts bucking, the one with the lead rope pulls [the horse] around.”