Cooling in Barrel Racing

My name’s Ashley Bull. I’m a straight shooter..and if you know me you can 100% agree with that statement, if you don’t-you will soon find out. I love meeting new people and hearing your stories/comments, so please feel free to reach out and contact me. I am on facebook, instagram and twitter (ashleyylynn77) But please also keep in mind that I am human, I am a girl, and I also have a personal life-these are my personal accounts and I am inviting you into my life, because I’m a nice person 😉
Who am I?
I’m just a girl with a heart for horses. I have grown up on the back of a horse. I have shown at club shows since the age of two, competed in rodeos since the age of 11, I have done a Wind Rider Challenge, an Extreme Cowboy Race, and the list goes on. We have a boarding facility that at any given time has 40 plus horses. We have a Precision Team (King Lyn Stable Precision Team). We also have a tack shop on site (Connie’s Tack Shop).
Who are we?
The absolute love of my life’s name is Spider. You will hear me talk about him again and again. I have had him since he was 5 years old and we have done everything together. From teaching him to barrel race to nursing him through a severe fence injury-we did it together. We have won three Rodeo Barrel Racing Championships together, and qualified for multiple Rodeo Finals together. He is my best friend-my one in a million! My other handsome boy is Alfie-he was born and raised on our farm. He started off showing both Western and English performance and is now my up and coming rodeo horse-this being his second year on the tour. He is my second in a million horse…I’m a very lucky girl!

Cooling in Barrel Racing and Pole Bending: #turnandburn #canchaser #getlow #ridefast #weave …you’ve seen it all. I don’t need to explain the sport. Tight turns, fast times-it is hard on your horse. Especially when the rodeo starts at two in the afternoon-it’s hot! You need to warm your horse up, get the blood pumpin’. Then you go and run for hopefully no more than 15/16 seconds, or 21/22 seconds and your horse comes out, nostrils flared, veins popped. How about you? Did you remember to breathe through that? Hopefully you take care of your horse first…walk him out-get the breathing back, get him untacked-bridle, saddle and boots off, and then the cooling process. Cool water hose-but the water coming off is still piping hot? Do you stand there until the water coming off is at least body temperature, or cooler? Or Sponging-how many buckets do you use? This is a lengthy process that I myself have always hated. Then you can undress yourself. There is nothing worse than seeing a fellow competitor come back and get themselves changed before taking care of their equine partner. There is a solution…
I was introduced to ECD through our Tack Shop. I am a firm believer in trying products on myself before trying them on my horses. Since my horse can’t tell me if something is or isn’t working, I need to figure it out myself. The first product I tried was the headband. I am an extreme migraine sufferer. I wore the headband while riding outside and could not believe how it kept me cool and kept the sweating to a minimum. And once I was finished, I grabbed my towel to wipe down my face and neck, then drape over my shoulders. It really was quite something. At that point I became more curious about the product. If it could make me feel like that, what can it do for my better half? So I decided to try the leg wraps. Simply playing around with them to see how they worked, I could not believe it! I put them on Spider’s legs, left them for two hours and came back-wraps still cold! I’m not going to say I was shocked…but I’m not not going to say it-if you know what I mean! I took the wraps off, and guess what; Spider’s legs were cool underneath too. This may not seem like a huge break through to you, but to me I got pretty excited! I would not plan to leave wraps on that long after an exercise but after two hours of not being touched and still cold-wow!
I have used a clay poultice in the past after a competition-and believe that I am not saying anything negative about them, they are great! But in between events at a rodeo or a horse show I am not going to poultice my horse. I’m not even keen on poulticing Spider after a rodeo for the trailer ride home-he likes to face paint and it ends up everywhere! ECD means no mess, no hassle. KISS-keep it simple stupid. Who doesn’t like easy?! Wet, Wring, Shake, Enjoy.
Since starting to use ECD I have had my horses do some unnecessary exercising in our hay field (my three good rodeo horses) and I needed to get their body temperatures down-ASAP. The neck and body wrap did an amazing job of both reducing temperature and minimizing sweat in such a short amount of time (one neck wrap, one body wrap-3 horses)! We had a flat tire on the way to a rodeo-not only the humans in the truck were enjoying the cool towels but as was my dog! She thought she wasn’t going to make it-and as we were on a major highway I was uncomfortable taking her out of the truck! I placed the towel on her belly and held her like a baby, and she went right to sleep.
I’m not a sales rep, I don’t make commission. I love horses. I love seeing riders kick it up a notch. I also “don’t fix what’s not broken”. Here I am at the end of July switching up my ‘routine’ if you will…and I NEVER do that. I must keep everything the same from the hair elastic I used last competition to the nail polish on my finger nails (there are others I dare not mention! :P). But I came across this product, and I can’t not put it into my routine! All I’m trying to do is spread the word about how amazing it is and hope that you will give it a try-if not for you, for your horse, your dog, your mom, dad, sister, brother…just kidding-who cares about your siblings (I’m an only child). Start out small, try it for yourself and see. And by all means, contact me! No hate mail please, I don’t want it and I don’t need it-I’m opening up for you my friends. Besides, you don’t want my sass 😉 I will continue to share my experiences with ECD using stories and pictures, and I hope you will join us!
Ashley, Spider, and Alfie