On The Rodeo Road

Curtis Cassidy says he’s always heard about Cowboy Christmas but never celebrated one.

Now he’s thinking it’s a neat deal.

Cowboy Christmas surrounds the July 1 and July 4 holidays in Canada and the U.S. and consists of about 30 high-paying stops on the rodeo trail.

Cassidy worked five of them and cashed at three to rake in a whopping $19,172 in prize money.

He won the steer wrestling at Ponoka for $9,843, gathered up another $4,700 in the same event at Cody, Wyo., collected $2,936 at Williams Lake, B.C., and added another $1,693 at the same rodeo in the calf roping.

“I also finished in the crying hole at St. Paul (Ore.) and Airdrie,” he said. “It’s been a really good week for me. I think the most I ever won is like $4,000 or $5,000 over the July holiday week.

“This was more the kind of Cowboy Christmas everybody talks about.” (read more)

Twenty-four-year-old Neil Holmes is struggling to make a name for himself in his first year in pro rodeo. A  big paycheck would be nice since he is working on a permit trying to earn a PRCA card.

Sunday afternoon in Belle Fourche, the Houston bull rider did both, and in dramatic fashion.

Holmes’s winning 85-point effort proved to be the only qualified ride of the entire rodeo and earned the young bull rider a Black Hills Roundup Rodeo record $10,251 paycheck.

“This is my first year in pro rodeo, I only have a permit and I pretty much have to go where they will take me,” Holmes said. “I’m sure glad I got a chance here in Belle Fourche. The weather was great, the people were great, and I had a beautiful outcome. Not much better than that.”

Not a bad weekend for a cowboy who entered at the last minute, driving all the way from Houston to compete in the Black Hills Roundup.

“I didn’t know the animal though I had a buddy call me last night and tell me that I had a good bull,” Holmes said. “And then when they ran him up it was actually a different bull, but it all worked out well. I did the same thing I do with every bull, try my hardest and see how it works out.”

Belle Fourche hospitality attracted another winner as well. Out-of-state cowboy — make that out of country cowboy —  Evan Jayne, a bareback rider who lists Marseille, France as his hometown, enjoyed the rodeo. (read more)

Greeley Stampede

Pro Rodeo Results

Ariat’s Satin Sheets 82Ariat’s Molly Brown 78Ariat’s Wonderland 87Ariat’s Freefall 84Ariat’s Special Reserve 0Ariat’s Night Moves 0

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Psst! Wanna know what’s better than a kick in the head, or being T-boned in an intersection.

The obvious and most logical answer would be just about anything.

For Todd Herzog, staying atop a bucking bronc is Numero Uno.

Wednesday night, Herzog rode Tom Dooley — even made him hang down his head — en route to an 84 in the saddle bronc riding at the Greeley Stampede.

Granted, that may not breaking news, but anytime Herzog skips a trip to the Justin Heeler rehabilitation trailer is a good day.

Wednesday night, it was all good.

“It felt good,” said Herzong, of Penhold, Alberta. “I feel really good. In fact, I think I’m back to where I should be since my rookie season in 2005.”

That was the year Herzog earned Rookie of the Year honors as a saddle bronc rider. Since then, he’s been beaten, broken, sewn up, bandaged, in-and-out of consciousness and not expected to live.

Tom Dooley kicked and turned circles just enough to give Herzog the lead in the saddle bronc competition, allowing him a chance at cashing in.

That’s a far cry from the time he was 15 when a bucking horse stomped on his head, forcing brain surgery to remove a blood clot on his brain.

“They went in and sucked the blood clot out, but they never put a plate in my head so they wired the bone back together,” Herzog said, displaying a large scar across the left side of his skull.

“I remember waking up in surgery,” said Herzog, 29. “I’ve also broke my (left) leg twice, and it has a an 11-inch steel pin in it.”

No injury — atop a bucking bronc or underneath one — was as traumatic as the car accident Herzog was in two years ago.

“I was going through an intersection and a guy on a tractor hauling Silage T-boned me on the driver’s side,” he said.

The results:

» A broken pelvis.

» A busted sacrum.

» Busted ribs.

» Internal bleeding in his stomach and brain.

Herzog was given a less than 10 percent chance to live.

“Anybody whoever has been hit by a tractor will know how tough that is,” he said. “I do remember when they were using the Jaws of Life to pull me out of my truck I could hear the crunching. I regained consciousness in the emergency room.” (read more and photo credit)

Scratch another starter from the Calgary Stampede roster.

Tanner Milan, second and third for the Canadian steer wrestling championship the past two years, tore up his right knee Wednesday at Ponoka’s Canadian Tour Rodeo.

The 26-year-old Cochrane cowboy, trying to catch a steer at the time, said his feet immediately stuck in heavy mud when he landed.

“I could tell I hurt my knee, but I didn’t hear a pop,” he said.

“But two guys behind the fence told me they heard a pop. My toe was dug in the mud and my body was twisted around. It didn’t look very good.”

Milan, second in the Canadian standings, was taken to hospital, where X-rays were taken.

“A doctor told me I tore my MCL for sure and he wasn’t sure about my ACL,” Milan said.

“I have an appointment on Friday morning with Dale Butterwick and the sport medicine people at University of Calgary. I just got to wait and see, I guess.”

When asked if he would miss the Stampede, Milan responded: “I think likely, yeah. It’s a little heartbreaking right now.”

It’ll be his first absence in four years. He earned a total of $25,000 in his previous three trips.

The mishap occurred in the morning slack and he was back behind the fence on crutches in the afternoon to watch younger brother Straws jump into the aggregate lead with 12.2 seconds on two runs.

“It sure would be good if he could replace me at Calgary,” Tanner said, “but I don’t have any control over that.” (read more and photo credit)

Lee Graves figures if he can do chin-ups, he can bulldog steers. And the world champion steer wrestler plans to do just that at the Calgary Stampede.

Graves, hazing for some of his travelling partners at Ponoka’s Canadian Tour Rodeo, confirmed he’ll come off the disabled list on the Tuesday of Stampede week.

The Calgarian has been out of action since the third week of March after tearing the bicep tendon off the bone in his left arm at the Reliant Stadium rodeo in Houston.

Dr. Tandy Freeman, medical director of the pro rodeo sports medicine team in Dallas, screwed the tendon back onto the bone and said it could take anywhere from four to six months to completely heal.

Graves said Tuesday he has been exercising regularly, even to the point of doing chin-ups.

He said he will haze for four rivals on the first four days of the Stampede, including Oregon cousins Trevor and Blake Knowles. (read more and picture credit)

PRESCOTT – In his personal life, Trevor Brazile is a Texas cowboy, horseman, husband and dad.

But, to his competitors and colleagues on the Professional Rodeo Cowboys of America (PRCA) rodeo circuit, Brazile must come off as some sort of combination of Tiger Woods and Roger Federer, except instead of a racket or a club he wields a rope.

He’s been that dominant.

“I’ve had just a super-blessed career,” Brazile said Tuesday from the road heading into Prescott. “I’ve tried to do my part, as far as working at it as hard as I could and not leaving anything to chance other than it already is in this sport.”

After breaking into the PRCA circuit in 1996 as a mere 19-year-old, it took Brazile, a native of Amarillo, Texas, six seasons before he won his first world title.

Since then, he’s never looked back.

That 2002 title was an all-around championship, given to the cowboy who in that season earned the most prize money in all of his combined events. He’s won that same title every year since 2002, save for 2005 when Ryan Jarrett displaced him.

“It was a wake-up call, for sure,” Brazile said of ’05. “It seems like after you’ve done it a few times, it seems like someone else is wearing your buckle.”

Brazile has also captured four other world titles, two each in steer roping (2006, 2007) and tie down roping (2007, 2009)…. (read more)

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RENO, Nev. – For team roper Kory Koontz, the win at the Reno Rodeo June 26 had just a little bit different feel than the two that had gone before it.
Koontz picked up his third set of silver spurs with new – and 23-year-old – partner Colby Lovell from Madisonville, Texas. The pair has only roped together for about a month.

“I have never roped with anyone who hasn’t made the Wrangler National Finals Rodeo,” said Koontz, who has qualified 14 times himself. “It was time for me to make a decision to either quit or to take a chance on a young guy.”
Well, now we know the rest of the story. Koontz, who turns 39 next month, did take that chance on a young, enthusiastic roper, who only switched from heeling to heading about 18 months ago.

Lovell may not be on some people’s radar, but he showed he knows how to rope when he finished second to Russell Cardoza at the World’s Greatest Roper on June 20, also held in Reno. The event tests a cowboy’s skill in heading, heeling and tie-down roping, and Lovell proved to be quite a hand. And he demonstrated no signs of jitters or inexperience at the Reno Rodeo.
Lovell and Koontz won the final round with a time of 5.7 seconds to hold off world record holders Chad Masters and Jade Corkill, who tied for second, stopping the clock in 6.0 seconds in the short round.

“I’m stoked,” said Lovell, who got a rousing ovation from the more than 8,000 fans on hand. “I was hollering when he caught. This is my first time out here, and to get the opportunity to rope at these big rodeos is great.”
Lovell, now fifth in the PRCA World Standings, and Koontz, sixth, clicked right away and hope Reno is a sign of things to come as the Gold stop on the Wrangler Million Dollar Tour, presented by Justin Boots, kicked off the lucrative summer run.

“I’ve been out here for 20 years, so it’s good for me to see the excitement in him,” Koontz said about Lovell. “It makes it fun for me. This is going to put us right back where we want to be and give us a good chance to win a championship.”

Lovell and Koontz led the average with a time of 16.9 seconds on three runs, followed by Masters and Corkill, a Nevada native, in 18.0 seconds. Lovell and Koontz also were the top money earners in Reno, pocketing $14,786 each. Koontz’s previous wins at the Reno Rodeo were with Matt Tyler in 1996 and Daniel Green in 2002.

Along with Koontz, a few other veterans were happy to add silver spurs to their trophy cases. Josh Peek, of Pueblo, Colo., won the all-around title competing in the steer wrestling and tie-down roping and left town with $6,319. He also won the all-around and tie-down roping at the Reno Rodeo in 2008.

An elated D.V. Fennell split the bareback riding title with Canadian Dusty LaValley. Fennell, 36, often teased for being among the older guys in roughstock – his buddies gave him a rocking chair at the Wrangler NFR last year when he qualified for the first time – won the final round with an 85-point ride on Big Bend Rodeo’s Diaper Dandy. LaValley, 28, was second in the finals, scoring 84 points on the strawberry roan mare Moulin Rouge of the Growney Brothers string.

The cowboys led the way with 246 points on three head. Fennell, a Missouri cowboy eyeing his first gold buckle, won $9,061 and LaValley pocketed $9,223.

Steer wrestler Gabe Ledoux sustained fractures in his left foot when a hazing horse stepped on him during a run at RodeoHouston in March. The Kaplan, La., cowboy has been working his way back to top form and showed he’s ready for the Fourth of July run by picking up his first set of silver spurs.
Ledoux (12.0 seconds on three runs) held off two-time World Champion Steer Wrestler Luke Branquinho (12.3 seconds) for the win. Branquinho (4.1 seconds) posted the fastest run in the short round, followed by Ledoux and Matt Reeves, who tied for second in 4.2 seconds. Ledoux collected $13,624 for his Gold tour victory.

“It’s unreal,” said Ledoux, who had 2006 World Champion Dean Gorsuch hazing for him. “I can’t believe that it has come true. It’s one of the best rodeos all year, and to win it feels really good.”

Bradley Harter won the saddle bronc riding with a score of 249 points on three head. The Weatherford, Texas, cowboy came into the final round with a 13-point advantage over Jesse Wright, 170-157. He needed the lead because Wright, the reigning Resistol Rookie of the Year, teamed up with 2009 Saddle Bronc Riding Horse of the Year Spring Planting for an 89-point effort and first place in the short round.

Harter’s 79 points on Big Bend Rodeo’s Bordello Blues was enough to hold off Rusty Allen (247) and Wright (246) and claim a check for $8,756.
In the tie-down roping, Joseph Parsons won the average in 27.9 seconds and pocketed $8,155. The Marana, Ariz., cowboy finished third in the final round, stopping the clock in 9.1 seconds to take the Reno title.
Corey Maier edged Steve Woolsey by one point, 168-167, on two head to claim the bull riding average and $9,118. Maier, from Timber Lake, S.D., split the top spot in the final round with D.J. Domangue, with both cowboys scoring 86 points. Maier stayed aboard Flying U Rodeo’s Domino Theory to secure the win. Domangue rode Pretty Boy Blue, also of Flying U Rodeo.

Barrel racer Timi Lickley had tears in her eyes after netting the biggest win of her career. The Jerome, Idaho, cowgirl doesn’t go to a lot of big rodeos, but thought she would give Reno a third and final try and she won the final round in 17.02 seconds to finish with 51.64 seconds on three runs and $7,787.
More than 700 cowboys participated in the 91st annual Reno Rodeo, which began on June 18. The June 26 final performance will be televised on In Country Television at 8 p.m. (ET) on July 10. Check your local listings for re-air dates and times.