Article- Janine Leichsenring Photos- Tania Hobbs
Rob riding his imported mare Pep N Coda Lena * at Q16
Rob Leach grew up near Mansfield in Victoria and now lives in Tamworth, NSW.
At the age of about six or seven years he started helping friends who had a trail riding business and ran cattle in the Victorian high country. It was his Dad who first helped get Rob into horses. His Dad was in the Mounted Police when Rob was younger and they always had horses around while they were growing up.
He got to ride many kinds of different horses as a youngster, but the first horse he could call his own was a Welsh Mountain pony mare called“ Poppy”. She was pretty green when he got her and started taking her to Pony Club. Poppy used to pigroot all the time and that’ s where Rob thinks he learnt how to ride rough stock.
The Pony Club he went to, from memory, had over 100 girls and 3 boys!
Whilst at Pony Club, he really got into the games and jumping. They also used horses in the mountains for mustering, and Rob always had a strong interest in cow related disciplines.
At age 15, he commenced working full time, as an assistant horse breaker for well-known campdrafters, the Matthews family, near Melbourne. They were primarily breaking and pre-training Thoroughbreds for the track. Here is where Rob first learnt about real horsemanship.
At 18, Rob headed to the Kimberley in WA. He worked in stock camps for a few years on properties such as Carlton Hill, Argyle Downs and Newry in the NT and was able to compete successfully at Campdrafts and Rodeos. At age 20, he took on a contract to break in horses for some large pastoral companies, Consolidated Pastoral, Tejas, Wallco and Heystbury Beef, along with some other smaller outfits. During that three year period he broke in over 700 horses.
During his time in the Kimberley, Rob met and married his wife Lee. Her father, John Quintana, was an American Rodeo Legend who had pioneered the live Cattle Export Industry in Northern Australia. One day John showed Rob a video of a fellow by the name of Greg Ward winning the Reined Cow Horse Futurity in Reno, Nevada. At that
Page 22 • The Australian Quarter Horse Magazine November • December • 2016