Des Allemands team takes struggling horse from grassless pasture, wins Reserve Champion at state 4-H show
One year ago, Cozie was malnourished and scared. The 2-year-old horse was in a pasture with almost 10 other horses that would bully her and keep her from food. She was terrified of humans and even of other horses.
Now, Cozie is a champion.
Thanks to a willing trainer, a helpful ranch owner and a confident teen, the filly competed in and placed several times in the State Horse Show in Monroe last month, including earning Reserve Champion in Reining. Cozie was ridden by Terry LeCompte, a Des Allemands teen whose mother and stepfather own the Rocking N Ranch, where Cozie is boarded.
“It’s a real rags to riches story,” LeCompte said. “It’s a really big deal to go out there and compete against $50,000 to $100,000 horses with a backyard horse.”
The July competition was the first time the horse had competed in a closed arena, but it was the finale to a long year of training and work by both the horse and trainers. Namatala “Tolly” Nassar bought Cozie, registered as “LM Can’t Touch That,” after hearing about her conditions in May 2010.
Nassar works with Steve Naquin, who owns Rocking N Ranch in Des Allemands with his wife, Bettie. Bettie and Steve had heard about Cozie and took a few people they knew to check her out. Both prospective buyers passed when they saw how poor the horse was doing, Nassar said.
When Nassar went out to see the horse, he knew he wanted to help her.
“She was very malnourished – really skinny. Her ribs were showing and she was very afraid of humans and her surroundings – this was more of a rescue job,” Nassar said.
He had been looking for a horse to give his daughter when she was older and Cozie seemed like a good chance to take.
“I actually bought her for my little girl but being as she’s a 4-year-old, I figured by the time the horse is trained and matured, it’ll be a perfect fit,” Nassar said.
The horse was so scared that Nassar and Naquin had to get all of the horses in the pasture into a pen and then lasso Cozie to get her in a trailer to take her to Rocking N Ranch. Nassar then went to Naquin’s ranch every day for two weeks and sat with the horse for an hour so that she would be comfortable around him.
“I took a lawn chair and set it under a tree that borders the pen.and I just let her walk around the chair and smell, and I would pet her and feed her,” Nassar said.
Getting the horse to trust humans was the biggest obstacle. After Nassar hurdled that, he and Naquin were able to train the horse and have her ready to show in one year. Training involved walking Cozie around a round pen, hanging bags from her saddle to get her used to the weight of a person, making noise with tractors and 4-wheelers to get her used to loud sounds, and traveling with her to other competitions in which she did not compete to get her used to traveling.
“I’m extremely, extremely proud,” Nassar said.
Bettie Naquin’s son, Terry LeCompte, took Cozie to the 4-H show and placed Reserve Champion in Reining as well as 10th place in Western Horsemanship and 5th in the Stock Pleasure Horse class.
“It’s a great feeling to take something from the wild and train it to compete in a state competition – I’m extremely proud of the horse and of Terry,” Nassar said.
Nassar said that once his daughter get a little older, he hopes she will take Cozie to competitions herself. Until then, he plans to continue to lease the horse to other riders so that she can keep winning.
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