Ranch Sorting

Mike Belter and Steve Olson win ranch sorting at the 2012 Adequan Select World Championship Show.

by Larri Jo Starkey
The American Quarter Horse Journal

Mission accomplished.

Mike Belter and Steve Olson knew what they needed to do to win their first world championships in ranch sorting.

After all, they had just won the world championship in team penning at the 2012 Adequan Select World Championship Show, so they were already in a championship frame of mind.

“(In) our prelim run, we were up early on,” Steve said. “I believe we were team 17 out of the 72, and we had a good go. We got seven head. I think we came back in second place overall out of the 72 prelims, so we knew we had to take care of it.”

In the finals, Steve and Mike were the last team to work through a herd of cattle that was all buddied up.

“We were fortunate to draw up last (in the finals),” Mike said. “We knew what we had to do. I went and started with a double right off the bat, got two cows, the nine (and the) zero, and after that, they just seemed to be laying perfect for us.”

Seven head sorted, with seconds still on the clock, they stopped and held the gap in the sorting pens, high fiving over their heads as the final buzzer sounded. They were the only team to sort 14 head in the preliminaries and the finals.

“We got seven head and stopped, because we knew what we needed,” Mike said. “It’s one of those things that doesn’t happen all the time, but when it does, it sure is nice.”

Mike was a world champion in team penning in 2010 and a reserve world champion in 2008. He was reserve world champion in amateur ranch sorting in 2010, but the September 1 world championship was the first at the Adequan Select World for the speed specialist from Hinton, Oklahoma.

He was riding Talkeetna Tari Olena, a 2000 bay gelding by Little Lenas Legend-Tari Time Freckles by Majestic Freckles. “Dollar” was bred by Ralph Lee of Anchorage, Alaska, and is owned by Alesia Belter.

“It’s my wife’s horse,” Mike said. “I have to give her credit for keeping him loped.”

The world championship is Steve’s first.

“It’s pretty sweet to get two in the same day,” he said. “The sorting was on SR Christy Cat. I need to thank Grady Underwood because Grady found that horse for me and taught it the game. It just this year has become a penning and sorting horse.”