Bill and Smart Abbey Rey Photo by: Lyndsey Lamell Photography
With fond memories of ranching and roping years ago, Bill Meyers has always enjoyed horses. He always wanted to try cutting and had Florida trainer, Ted Sokol recommended to him. Meyers met Sokol at a cutting show who put him on a horse. He then went to Sokol’s ranch for a lesson and officially caught the cutting bug two years ago.
Meyers owns a construction company that involves a lot of traveling and during COVID that wasn’t possible. He was able to dedicate six months to riding with Sokol five to six days a week.
“I got about three years of lessons in that time. They would lock the gate on me and I would just climb over the gate [to get more lessons],” he said with a laugh.
When he wasn’t cutting he was turning back. Meyers learned so much watching Sokol train 20 horses a day. Meyers said he has met some of the best people. It’s one of his favorite things about the sport.
“Everyone is out to help everyone…It blows me away that even amongst themselves, it’s more about competing against the cows.”
Meyers competes in aged events and at the 2022 Augusta Futurity he won the 4 Year Old Limited Amateur Champions. His greatest highlight so far has been showing at the Futurity this past year. He also showed in the amateur finals at the Summer Spectacular and was excited to make the 5 / 6 Limited Amateur and Amateur finals.
Some of Meyers’ favorites videos are those by Gabe Reynolds and Guy Woods. Now Gabe Reynolds helps him in the pen and he bought one of the horses Guy Woods rides in his CHTO videos.
Meyers is grateful for the people he has met in the cutting horse industry. He is especially thankful for his family’s support, Ted and Kathy Sokol, Roberson Performance Horses and Curry Diehl and Dunn Diehl Farms.
Why Bill Uses CHTO:
“Just like every show you can go to and learn something, every time I watch a video there’s something I can pick up. You can only learn so much while you’re on the back of a horse. I like the fact that I can go on [CHTO] and watch multiple videos…You can always pick up something different just because of that person’s experience or the way they explain it.”