8 Seconds: Bull Riding

Rule No. 1 of bull riding: Do not grab the bull by the horns. Rule No. 2: Don’t let the bull’s horns grab you.

RODEO ANNOUNCERS CALL BULL RIDING “THE MOST DANGEROUS EIGHT SECONDS IN SPORT.” MY WIFE, KELLI, CALLS IT JUST PLAIN CRAZY. AND ME? I CALL IT A CHALLENGE, WHICH IS WHY I RECENTLY FOUND MYSELF SITTING ATOP A 1,400-POUND BULL, ABOUT TO GIVE IT A GO FOR THE FIRST, AND HOPEFULLY NOT THE LAST, TIME.

I've come to Dean Drake’s Rodeo Company in Penrose, Colo. – a broad swath of ranch land between the Arkansas River and Fort Carson Military Reservation – as a student in the Sankey Rodeo School’s Fantasy Adventure Bull Riding Clinic; three intensive days during which I’d learn to ride a bull, or at least get maimed trying. Lyle Sankey, a former bull-riding champion and one of only four cowboys in rodeo history to qualify for the National Finals Rodeo in all three rough stock events (bull riding, bareback and saddle bronc), founded the school 30 years ago. Since then, he’s earned a reputation for being the best in the business.

Every year, hundreds of bull riders, both experienced and first-timers, sign up for one of more than 30 clinics held across the country. There are 15 of us here in Penrose, and we’re a motley crew of 13 men and two women. We come from seven states and Canadian provinces, and from equally diverse backgrounds. A select few have been on a bull before; the rest of us are bull-riding virgins who don’t fully appreciate what we’ve gotten ourselves into.

Day One, Friday morning, dawns hot and sunny, and a dry wind blows dust between my teeth. After spending the morning getting set with gear – spurs, bull rope, bells, rosin and riding glove – and practicing technique, it’s time to get on livestock. We walk through the arena and into a holding area behind the bucking chutes, the gated steel boxes that hold a bull and cowboy until it’s time to ride.

I’m nervous with anticipation. It doesn’t help that, as I don a protective vest and helmet, Russell, one of the more timid students in our class, gets bucked off his bull. I watch as he’s knocked unconscious and begins convulsing in the dirt. The bull flips him over once before the bullfighters are able to gain the beast’s attention and usher the crumpled cowpoke wanna-be out of the arena. Russell finally comes to, and we all watch in concerned disbelief as an ambulance takes him to the hospital, fitted with a neck brace and a backboard. Now it’s my turn to ride.

This is insane, I think to myself, looking around at my classmates’ faces. Their expressions all seem to register a similar thought: Why am I doing this again? But before I have time to ponder my fate long enough for second thoughts to surface, Sankey’s eyes meet mine. “Time to focus, Pete,” he says. “You’re up.”

I climb over the top of the bucking chute and down onto my bull, a reddishbrown brute with thick, two-foot horns. I set my bull rope around the beast’s torso, just behind his shoulders. Strangely, my nerves have calmed – I’m too focused to panic. I place my hand palm-side up under the bull rope while a helper pulls it taut. Then I take a wrap – lay the tail of the bull rope across my palm, pass it behind my wrist and across my palm again – so that three strands of rope firmly pin my riding hand to the back of an animal that weighs 10 times as much as I do.

I brace my hand on the top rail of the bucking chute and set my legs. An anonymous voice cuts through my focus: “Have fun, cowboy!” There’s only one thing left to do: What cowboys call the “slide and ride.” I pull my body forward until I’m braced over my bull rope and nod my head. The gate swings open and the bull violently explodes out of the chute.

He bucks hard twice, jarring my riding arm. Suddenly I have the distinct feeling of being airborne. I hit the ground hard and immediately start scrambling to my feet. Bulls don’t stop just because you fall off, and you’re not safe until either the bull or you are out of the arena. When I watch my ride on video later – all 1.5 seconds of it – I see that the bull was right behind me, his horns inches from my backside.

Day Two, Saturday, follows much the same formula: ride a bull, watch the video replay, and limp around complaining about all the new bruises and sore spots that have surfaced since your last ride. Early Saturday afternoon, Carlos, a twenty-something college student from Colorado Springs, turns to me with a wry smile: “So far it’s Bulls two, Carlos zero.”

Things haven’t gone much differently for the rest of us. Qualifying rides – those lasting the eternity of eight seconds and the standard to which all cowboys aspire – are few and far between. But we’re getting better – albeit slowly and painfully – and we’re bonding as a group. Like combat veterans, our friendships are forged through a shared experience that threatens life and limb.

Bull riding is relentlessly hard on the body, and my classmates and I are hobbling, Ibuprofen-popping testaments to that fact. In addition to Russell’s injuries, we’ve collectively logged a broken pubic bone, a shattered ankle requiring a pin, a broken finger, several concussions and more scrapes, cuts, bruises, contusions and sore muscles between us than I can count. This is par for the course. Bull riding has the highest injury rate of any pro rodeo event, and 36 percent of those injuries are considered serious: major concussions, broken bones and torn ligaments. In fact, a month and a half before I arrived here, a 25-year-old was killed at a similar bull-riding school in Ohio; it was his second ride of the weekend. The bull bucked him off and stepped on him; his internal injuries were too severe.

It’s a sobering reality check, and hammers home the disturbing fact that experience has no influence on your likelihood of being injured. Whether you’ve ridden a bull once or you’ve been doing it for 20 years, your chances of injury don’t change. Sooner or later, you’re going to get hurt. It’s just a matter of when and how badly, and I only hope my number doesn’t come up this weekend.

Unlike Friday and Saturday, Day Three, Sunday, is overcast and cold, with intermittent rain and snow. The bulls seem ornery, and so are we. Our rate of attrition has been high; only a handful of us ride today. I, for one, am feeling confident. I’ve rehearsed the perfect ride dozens of times in my head. I even dreamt about bull riding the night before. This is my last chance to get it right – my fourth and final bull for the weekend.

As it turns out, he’s actually a giant white “beefalo” – a cross-breed between a bull and a buffalo. It’s time to “cowboy up” one more time. I settle into the bucking chute on top of my bull, take a wrap, nod my head, and the gate swings wide open. The “beefalo” bucks out of the chute hard, but several bucks later, partly to my surprise, I’m still riding. My legs are tight around his torso; my riding arm feels strong. As seconds tick by, I start to come undone, looking more and more like a rag doll strapped to the back of the family dog. Then, just as I’m about to fall off, I hear a whistle blow – eight seconds. I scored my first-ever qualifying ride. It may not have looked pretty by the end, but it sure felt great. In an instant, all the aches and pains vanish, supplanted by a joyous rush of adrenaline.

And that reward is maybe what bull riding is all about. Despite the obvious risk, and despite the inevitable pain, bull riding is fun, even addictive. Perhaps it’s because something about riding is undeniably authentic – there’s no room for poseurs in this sport. Or because riding puts you in touch with the romanticized heritage of the Old West. Maybe, as someone said on Day One, it’s because “chicks dig it.” Or maybe it’s the glory of testing your manhood against a bull, eight seconds at a time, and succeeding. Sometimes.

For some of us, this was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Others will go on to ride another day, with more rodeos in their future. In the end, though, we all walk away from the experience wearing the same black-and-blue badge of honor, with no regrets.