The Emperor’s New Groove
At 5 a.m. every morning, Winston Hansma walks into the concrete halls of his Weatherford, Texas, barn, flips on the first set of lights and dumps feed into the stall of his aging stud, CD Lights. He opens his tack room lined with well-worn saddles, snaffles and heavy-made correction bits. Then he retreats to the house for breakfast and a few cups of coffee with his wife, Danny Motes, before heading back to the barn to saddle his 2- and 3-year-old cutters at 7 a.m.
By that time, the sun is peaking over the trees that line their pipe-and-cedar pastures, and the Texas dew is still wet on the grass. But the clay and the sand of the arenas—both indoor and out—are all worked to perfection and the cattle are sorted into pens, ready for the day’s work.
Hansma doesn’t have nearly as many horses to get through anymore at the barn he shares with his son-in-law and fellow National Cutting Horse Association Hall-of-Fame Rider R.L. Chartier,
