What Makes a Heel Loop Work?

In the placement of the loop, the bottom part is the catcher. The loop can come in from different angles around the right side of the steer. But the ability to control the bottom part of your loop— and the angle that the top and bottom are in— determines whether you can control the bottom part of the loop to be the catcher.

- Kendra Santos, Phil Doyle Photos

​When I was a kid watching guys rope, I knew which ones could catch all the time. And I knew that there was something about those loops that allowed them to catch two feet every time—things like delivery, placement and the timing aspect. I could see right off that they were roping the steers in the middle of the jump. They had the ability to get the steer roped between the time his feet left the ground and hit the ground again. I was probably 13 or 14 years old, and my stepdad, Geno (Gene O’Brien), used to take me to the Riverside Rancheros Roping (a 10-steer average), Chow chilla Stampede (an eight-steer) and the Oakdale 10-Steer. Those were the big averages back then. I asked one of the top ropers of that time a question about the loop, and his comment was, “I get the bottom of the loop on the ground.” That instantly made sense to me, so from that time on I concentrated on controlling the bottom of my loop.