Contest pairs horse trainers with wild mustangs As a Johnny Cash tune played over the loudspeakers, horse trainer Gary Main Jr. coaxed Victory through a display of discipline and skill inside the Wyoming State Fair arena. Hundreds of potential horse buyers looked on as Victory stopped on a dime, backed up on command and trotted along the perimeter. On this day, the horses were not from breeders but rather the Western range — separated from their wild origins by only a few months of training. Faced with a surplus of wild horses, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management and its nonprofit partner, the Mustang Heritage Foundation, have been holding a series of training contests and subsequent adoptions like the Mustang Challenge held in Wyoming this summer. Adoption is likely the best outcome for the horses. The BLM, citing budget constraints and the ever-multiplying herds of mustangs that roam free on federal land in the West, said this summer it was studying ways to get rid of excess horses, including euthanasia. To try to boost the number of adoptions, Patti Colbert, executive director of the mustang foundation, came up with the idea of the horse-training competitions while watching reality TV shows....