Not only does Bob Giacolone have one eye-catching horse, but he does some pretty eye-catching work. Late last year I got to talk with the man who’s lived many different lives from training and showing pleasure horses, becoming a top hair stylist, owner of a popular spa, and then becoming the 2005 National High Point Champion for the Cowboy Mounted Shooting Association. Now he’s known for his designs for mounted shooting stars such as Annie Bianco, adding rhinestones to chaps, hats, shirts, etc.

Here is his story I wrote for Western Shooting Horse Magazine:

The word “flash” has so many different meanings: to move with great speed, to give off light suddenly or in transient bursts, or to have sudden insight. All three of these definitions could be ways to describe Bob Giacolone.

He’s made his mark—whether it be from his sharp shooting or the reflection off of his rhinestones—in the shooting world for the past 13 years. The 64-year-old Senior Men’s Level 5 is known for his fl ash in, and out of, the arena.

Growing Up on Horseback

Life on the road isn’t anything new to Bob–he grew up showing horses with his father. By the time he was 16, he started showing other people’s horses and traveled all across the country.

“I have pretty much [showed horses] all my life— 50 years practically of showing horses,” he admits.

He started first with pleasure horses, but then he first found his adrenaline rush in showing cutting horses in 1978. He was top ten in the nation for the National Cutting Horse Association (NCHA) in 1981 with Macs Sugar Bars.

Bob passed on his joy of showing horses to his young sons at the time, and the family hit the road after he sold his cutting horses. “I sold my cutting horses because my boys wanted to start showing pleasure and stuff, so I just drug my boys around showing horses,” he explains.

As a father, Bob always knew he had to do what was right for his kids. After a few years of his sons Ahren and Adam showing horses, they decided they didn’t want to do it any more. Bob sold their horses and moved closer to town because the kids didn’t want to be in the country anymore.

“That was the biggest mistake I ever made,” admits Bob.

Read the rest of the article on WesternShootingHorse.com