Barrel Racing

trusty sorrel steed Rooster stopped the clock in a sizzling 2.05 seconds to wow the PBR Finals crowd. But first, she and her women’s polo team had the Texas Women’s Open to win down in Houston. The championship—256 miles away— started at 2 and went until 3:30. The final PBR Finals perf started at 4:30.

Moments after the biggest win of her polo-playing career, Madi’s mom, Kristy, put Madi and her little brother, Ace, on a private plane to Arlington, where Dad Mike met them and had Rooster saddled and ready to roll. Madi and Ace arrived at 5:15, she roped the dummy a few times at the trailer, and inside that magnificent battlefield they went. The poise that young lady—a high school senior who at the time had just been accepted to start college at Texas A&M—exhibited while under such stress and pressure were something special to behold.

“It’s been a great day, to say the least,” beamed Madi, who won the 2019 American Rodeo at AT&T at 16. “I’m just so thankful to the women before me who paved the way for women’s rodeo and such an amazing opportunity as this. I’m so grateful to get to rope on such a big stage. I’m in awe every time I walk into this building.”

Not every contestant who started the week advanced to AT&T. But memories were made and friendships forged, and each and all left with the priceless experience of partaking in the richest women’s rodeo of all time. World-class barrel racing ballerina Maggie Poloncic and her magic barrel racing dragon Puff—the same pair that went on to get the win at Rodeo Corpus Christi earlier this year— won some money at Will Rogers, then returned to the Cowboy State of Wyoming, to get back to being the Associate Director of Dance Arts Gillette.

The eldest contestant in the WRWC cowgirl crowd, 65-year-old Peggy Kellogg Buetzer, roped up a storm in Texas, then went back to serving society’s greater good as a home-health nurse in Oklahoma.

California native turned Texas transplant mom Lynnette Krantz got to rope with and alongside both of her daughters, Taryn Krantz Castodio and Erica Krantz Lozares. “From where I came from—$10 jackpots—getting to experience roping for $60 grand with my girls makes me speechless and proud,” Lynnette said. “I will always cherish this.”

We were all thrilled to see two-time Barrel Racing Champ of the World Lindsay Sears again after making her last Wrangler National Finals Rodeo in 2012 and exiting stage right. “Full-time rodeo is exhausting, and to be great at traditional rodeo it has to be your sole existence,” said Sears, who now works in the family business and splits her time between her native Canada and Texas. “The fact that I don’t have to go rodeo all year and rodeo hard, but still have a shot at big money like this is what attracts me. This didn’t exist in rodeo before the WCRA.”

Hollie and Jacie Etbauer are perfect poster people for the WCRA women’s rodeo hashtag #ItsOurTime. Hollie’s husband and Jacie’s dad, Billy, won five gold bronc riding buckles in his Hall of Fame career. After their unwavering support of his hopes and dreams, the tables have turned in the Etbauer family dynamic. Now it’s time for their barrel racing breeding and training program to come first.

“Billy’s basically told us that it’s our turn,” Hollie said. “He takes care of the place, and starts all the colts. He even trims them when they’re babies. Billy puts the base on these horses that makes it easy for Jacie and I to go on with them. Billy’s the wagon hub of our training program—and our family.” Danielle Lowman, Bailey Bates and Serena Dahozy made an impressive showing at the WRWC, then returned home to their native Navajo Nation to tell the young girls behind them that if they work hard enough this is all possible for them, too. Erich Rogers, Aaron Tsinigine and Derrick Begay have done this for their community’s native sons. Now Lowman, Bates, Dahozy and Kassidy Dennison are delivering the same message of hope and opportunity to the native daughters.

After a week of watching new doors slung wide open for the women of rodeo, I walked out of AT&T Stadium last fall exhausted in the best possible way. I thought of my dear friend Betty Gayle Cooper, who beat up her brother Roy— yes, the roping-revolutionizing Super Looper himself—in childhood matches. Cancer took her from us before she could see all of this for herself, but Betty Gayle never gave up on having it all.

She got married, had her beautiful baby boy, Cooper, and roped her heart out until she couldn’t get out of bed anymore. I just know Betty Gayle is smiling about all of this up in Heaven, and agrees with what Jackie had to say about the possibilities for all women in rodeo—and life—right now. Oh, and the Women’s Rodeo World Championship will return in 2021—and will again run in conjunction with the PBR World Finals, November 1-6, when it returns to the South Point in Las Vegas.

“It’s such an exciting time to be a part of this sport,” Jackie said. “This is big money, and it’s real money. A girl can now win a quarter of a million a year pretty easily, thanks to events like this one. I want women to know that they can have it all. It’s hard, and it’s challenging. But don’t cut yourself short in life and what’s after this career. I can do it, and so can you.”

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BARREL RACING 101

Barrel Racing requires the ultimate connection between two athletes – the horse and the rider. For a barrel racer, communication with the horse is paramount. Using their hands and feet, the rider cues the horse to turn in the desired direction. At speeds nearing 30 miles per hour, it is important to maintain control to make tight turns for a safe and successful run. Horse and rider maneuver through a fixed, cloverleaf-shaped pattern of three barrels, with the goal to be the fastest to the finish line. They may choose to go around the right or left barrel first, with two turns in the opposite direction to follow. If they happen to knock over a barrel during the run, a five second penalty will be added onto their final time. Times are calculated to the thousandth of a second, and the fastest time wins.