An Interview with
ZEKE THURSTON Rodeo Life: How has the rodeo life and competing been different since starting a family and having your kids Lucy and Hardy? Do you hope they get involved in rodeo one day? Zeke Thurston: It makes me want to go home a lot more and that makes you not want to leave home, but they love it, and when you get to take them with you, that’s even better. That's how I grew up and I honestly don't think there's any other better way to grow up. Rodeo itself is a great big family and when you share that with your kids, it's very special. Whether I win, lose, or draw they are there. They don't care, they are there to cheer you on so it's pretty fun. I would sure enjoy it if they did, but if they choose to go a different direction in life, I’m 100% supportive. As long as they put 100% effort into whatever they want to do, I'll be satisfied. RL: How was it navigating the rodeo world through COVID-19 last year? How have things been this year still dealing with COVID-19? ZT: It was difficult to be honest. It made it really hard to come home. The borders were closed which made it so that we couldn't see our families. There really was no plus side to it. They cancelled a lot of rodeos because of it, but we made it. It was hard on a lot of people and made it tough. We went to a lot rodeos that I'd never been to and probably never would have gone to so that part of it was fun. It was neat to go to the smaller rodeos. This year went pretty well. Everything kind of went back normal and we just went back to our old routine. We have this little trail that we make and we just followed that again as normal. We didn't get back to any of the ones that we hadn't been to before, but maybe one day we might.
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Rodeo LIFE
