In this switch-end session, Clay O'Brien Cooper heads on a green colt he started heeling on last fall and breaks down the feel he's after in a head horse, from a collected frame and dropped hindquarters to soft, adjustable control through the corner. He talks about developing a young horse throug...

In this switch-end session, Jake Barnes and Clay O'Brien Cooper flip their roles, with Jake heeling and Clay heading, and the conversation gets honest fast. Jake, a header for most of his pro career, opens up about how much harder heeling is for him, why timing the fast-hopping cattle feels like ...

In the final session before Reno, Jake Barnes and Clay O'Brien Cooper get into the mental side of roping and what it takes to stay sharp when you're living on the road. Clay explains how the best ropers process information in bits and pieces, making adjustments off just a handful of runs instead ...

Still prepping for Reno, Jake Barnes and Clay O'Brien Cooper turn up the intensity in this session and leave the pen with confidence. Jake breaks down how to handle a steer that keeps ducking left, why steer training matters when a steer won't give you a good pattern, and how to regroup mid-pract...

On day two of filming in the practice pen, Jake Barnes and Clay O'Brien Cooper get ready for the Reno Rodeo and dig into the science of making fast, repeatable runs. Both legends are big believers in studying film the way pro athletes do, and in this session they break down exactly what the tape ...

Clay knows exactly what he misses most: his 25-year-old body. Life is a blessing and youth is a special thing, but beyond the physical it is the people he misses most. The friendships, the old buddies, and the time spent with people who understood the life. Clay gets personal talking about the Ya...

Jake and Clay get asked one of those questions that says a lot about a person. Clay's answer is straightforward: he grabs whatever his wife tells him to or heads for the cash and the safe. Beyond that, the trinkets don't mean as much as people might think. The memories live between him and God, a...

Jake and Clay look back at the runs that defined their careers, winning the George Strait, the BFI, and the NFR, and the ones that still sting. Clay roping a leg when they were on the verge of winning the George Strait is one that comes up fast. They talk about the luck of the draw, how confidenc...

Jake and Clay get honest about the lean years and how they managed them. Jake says he was never broke because he always had roping schools running on the side, keeping money coming in during the dry spells. Clay took a different route, borrowing money from his grandma once and paying her back rig...

Jake and Clay take a trip down memory lane and talk about what life on the road actually looked like. They remember the rigs they traveled in, from Dodge Cummins trucks to Capri campers, and taking their families along for the ride. They had their roles figured out early: Clay drove at night and ...

Jake and Clay sit down and go back to the beginning. Jake first saw Clay rope in college and at the World Junior Finals and knew right away he was watching something special. His own roping education came from the Ropers Sports News, and he and Clay reminisce about the old days and how the sport ...

Clay O'Brien Cooper breaks down one of the fundamental dynamics of the swing: you are either a locker or a roller. He demonstrates both on the dummy, walking through the advantages and disadvantages of each and how rope speed factors into both styles. There is no right or wrong answer, just what ...

Clay O'Brien Cooper makes a point that not enough ropers take seriously: throwing a lot of loops does not mean you are getting better. If you are practicing the wrong way you are only building bad muscle memory, and that is harder to fix than starting from scratch. The goal is to practice correct...

Jake Barnes looks back at how much roping has changed over the years. Cattle were bigger with bigger horns, horse power was different, and the style of roping has evolved right along with it. He gets into rope angles and how his own approach has shifted over time, including the benefits of his ha...

Jake Barnes picks up the dummy rope and makes the case for one of the most underrated practice tools in the game. If you are short on time or can not always get to the arena, 25 to 30 minutes a day on the ground dummy for a month will sharpen you up. He walks through loop mechanics, roping theori...

Jake and Clay get into what it actually takes to be successful: hard work, grinding, and understanding that mental exhaustion builds you up rather than breaks you down. When you are young roping never feels like a job, and they say that mindset is everything. They talk about the difference betwee...

Jake and Clay head into another practice session with two very different horses under them. Jake's horse is a little fragile in the box so he keeps it to five runs focused on getting ready for competition. Clay is on a green horse and going with the flow, taking what he gets. Jake is honest about...

Jake and Clay get back to work, making practice runs and talking through what is coming up in each one. They share the story of a match roping where each partner had to head five and heel five and they came out on top. On a typical day they are putting in 25 to 35 runs, getting the reps in and wo...

Jake Barnes has spent his life heading, but his love of heeling and the challenge it brings out a different side of his competitive nature, especially when the pressure is on at the World Series Finale. He talks through the difficulty of staying aggressive when you are trying to just catch rather...

The answer is simple: they roped 24/7, nonstop, as fast as they could go, and they had the desire to win. Clay grew up with a stepfather who was an old school cowboy, riding broncs and bulldogging, and he was a good catcher. Rodeo was all Clay ever wanted to do and that hunger showed up every sin...

Jake and Clay mix methodical runs with wide open ones, and both serve a purpose. Running steers as fast as they can go keeps you sharp and translates directly to the rodeos they are entered up at. Jake talks through his horses including a 12-year-old mare from Max Kuttler that serves as his secon...

For Jake Barnes and Clay O'Brien Cooper, a day in the practice pen is just another day doing what they love, but there is nothing random about how they go about it. They have reprogrammed their sessions to get the most out of every run, using slower cattle for their horses and faster cattle for t...