(Riverton, Wyo.) – The Rustlers competed at their hometown rodeo this past weekend. It was nice that they didn’t have to travel, but putting on a rodeo is a lot of work. They not only proved that they are a hard working team while in competition, but also while they helped produce one of the ten regional rodeos. After the dust settled, they were able to capture an All-Around title, and make some headway in individual standings as well as team standings.
Sophomore Karson Bradley led the way for the Women’s team making it back to to the short round in the barrel racing. She finished eighth in the long round with a time of 18.36, but just like she had done the previous weekend in Sheridan, she smoked the rest of the competition with the fastest run of the weekend, a 17.85! This run led to her winning the short round, and moving her up to second in the average.
The Men’s team made a push in the regional standings, now splitting second and third with Sheridan College after three rodeos. They were led by the All-Around Champion for the weekend, Brady Thurston. Brady made it back in both the Steer Wresting and the Saddle Bronc Riding. He squeaked into the short round of the Steer Wrestling, splitting tenth and eleventh with a time of 5.4, but followed that up with the fastest time of the rodeo, a 4.0. This run placed Brady in first place in the short round and moved him up to third in the average. He also placed third in the average of the Saddle Bronc after placing third in the long round with a 75, and splitting second and third in the short round with a 74. Teammate Thomas Davis was also busy during the championship round making it back in two events as well. Thomas placed third in the average of the Bareback Riding, after splitting sixth and seventh in the long round with a score of 68, but followed that up with a 76 in the short round, placing him second in that round. He then hustled down to the timed event where his short round steer awaited him. He split third and fourth in the long round with a 4.9 second run, but had a slow handling steer in the short round that he tipped over in 6.7 seconds which wasn’t fast enough to place in the round and dropped him to ninth in the average. Also contributing to the Men’s team was Nate Weyrich. He split third and fourth in the long round with teammate Thomas Davis throwing his steer in 4.9, but after almost missing his short round steer he was a 9.2 in the short round which dropped him to eleventh in the average.
“It feels good to have our hometown rodeo in the books,” said Coach Drew Schrock. “To date I feel like this is by far the best rodeo that we have produced since I have been the coach here. There is no way that it would have happened without the hard-working team, coaching staff (Cally Schrock, Josee Vogel), athletic department, fair grounds, stock contractors, sponsors, rodeo booster club, and the list goes on and on. I can’t thank everyone enough for helping produce the Rustler Roundup Rodeo. I think the highlight of the weekend was on Friday. We invited all the elementary schools to bus their kids in for a noon rodeo, not all of them were able to make it but the ones that did seemed to have a great time and everyone in the region enjoyed hearing them giggle and cheer throughout the performance. I will definitely schedule it for noon on Friday next year and hopefully we can get all of the elementary schools there.”
“I am so proud of this team and how hard they worked all weekend. I had numerous compliments on what great people they are, and I feel honored to be their coach. It’s also awesome that they not only worked their butts off all weekend, but they were able to compete well in front of their hometown crowd. We will get three days of practice in this week before we leave for Lamar, Colorado on Thursday.” -Coach Schrock