Photo: Jeff McIntosh/Associated Press.
Emma Eastwood stretched before competing in women’s ranch bronc during rodeo action in Alberta.
I’ve mentioned before how interesting it was to me that my husband’s director of manufacturing at the Maple Grove company was a bull rider on the side. We told Craig we’d love to see a Minnesota rodeo, and he sent us off to nearby Buffalo, where we had a wonderful time.
In today’s story, we learn about the rising numbers of women getting a kick out of riding bucking broncos.
The Associated Press (AP) reports, “Sophia Bunney launched the first time she tried ranch bronc riding, landing ‘quite a ways away from the horse.’
“ ‘I’m very stubborn, and I don’t like being defeated,’ said the 18-year-old from Cessford, Alberta.
“In other words, the teenager was hooked on a sport that pits women against bucking horses for eight seconds.
“ ‘I always kind of wanted to hop on a bronc,’ Bunney told the Canadian Press. ‘In Grade 3 … I said I wanted to be a female bronc rider.’
“Unlike saddle bronco riding, a rodeo mainstay, ranch bronc uses a regular western saddle — not a specialized one — and riders hang on with two hands instead of one. A hand is on a rein and the other on a strap wrapped around the saddle horn.
“Pearl Kersey, who won the Canadian women’s ranch bronc title [recently] in Ponoka, Alberta, is president of Women’s Ranch Bronc Canada and teaches it at clinics.
“ ‘I’ve got teenagers, 20-year-olds, 30-year-olds, and this year a woman in her 50s. I was like, “You sure?” ‘ Kersey said. ‘She doesn’t want to compete. She wants to try it before she gets too old. We have bucking machines. She doesn’t necessarily need to get on a horse’. They can go through all the drills and the bucking machine, and if they’re comfortable enough, they can get on a horse.’ …
“It took a while for 19-year-old Blayne Bedard, who grew up cow riding in the Canadian Girls Rodeo Association, to master keeping her feet forward toward the horse’s shoulders.
“ ‘If they come back, I’m like a pendulum and I just go head over teakettle,’ Bedard said. … She’s improved to the point where Bedard has competed in the last two Canadian championships.
“ ‘I like the look of it, too,’ Bedard said. ‘You get cool pictures.’
“One of the lessons Bedard picked up at a Kersey clinic had nothing to do with riding form — and everything to do with what goes inside a boot.
“ ‘I put baby powder in my boots every time before I ride, and I wear my mom’s boots that are a size too big for me, because if you get your foot stuck in a stirrup — which I’ve had a few times — you need your boot to be able to come off so you’re not being dragged by the horse,’ she said. …
“Kersey, 36, has qualified for the world finals July 19-20 in Cheyenne, Wyoming, where she won in 2019 and has twice finished second. Kersey intends to retire from competition after this year, but continue teaching.
“One of her students, Calgary’s Emma Eastwood, picked it up quickly thanks to years of riding horses and a stint as an amateur jockey. She attended Kersey’s clinics last fall and this spring, and won an event in just her third time competing.
“ ‘It is difficult to try and think through your ride and hang on through all that adrenaline,’ said the 27-year-old massage therapist. ‘Things kind of get a little blurry, and it’s hard to process everything going on so quickly.’ …
“Kersey said … ‘Women have come up to me and said, “Thank you for doing what you’re doing.” They might not go into ranch broncs, but it just gave them the power in themselves to go pursue something that they wanted that they didn’t think they could because they were women,’ Kersey said. ‘Other girls tell me, ‘” saw you ride at Ponoka,” and they’re like, “I want to try it.” Sometimes it’s a confidence-booster thing. Sometimes they want to see if they’ll like it and some are like, “Yeah, I’m doing this.” ‘
More at the Associated Press via the Boston Globe, here.
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