Now truly convinced that he had discovered a better way of working with his horses, Dale decided to take a newly acquired 3-year-old colt to one of Clinton’s clinics in the fall of 2008. “I was nervous because the horse was new and my stick, string and rope coordination was not great,” Dale explains. “But I opened myself up to Clinton’s critiques, improved my rhythm and backed off the barbarianism. I went home more knowledgeable, excited and motivated than ever before.”
Dale carried his motivation straight to the members of the Westernaires Drill Team. “I watched people’s horses and saw how belligerent and pushy they were,” Dale says. “All of that stuff that I had thought was normal, I now realized was not only abnormal, but dangerous.”
To add to his own knowledge and to help others, Dale began to offer his help in solving horse problems for free. He admits that at first people were skeptical and didn’t understand what he was doing. “Then they started to watch me work in the arenas. I started to get a little bit of an audience. Every weekend I would have a list of people who wanted help and I’d work with each horse for an hour,” Dale remembers. Without even trying to, he began to establish a reputation. “Because people had so many horses they were willing to let me work with, I was able to really practice the Method. My training ability went completely from one end of the scale to the other.” It was then that he realized how much he enjoyed helping people experience the benefits of the Method and working with their horses.