A Beginner’s Guide to Rodeo

_Elsa_

As Olivia looks for more information on rodeos she begins to daydream of herself as a cowgirl with lasso in hand. Now that’s a great dream! She is getting very excited at the thought of learning all about the rodeo. 

‘Head to any small county in Texas, South Dakota, Wyoming, New Mexico, or basically anywhere in the West and Northwest, and you will likely have an opportunity to see the local rodeo in town. If fact, the Fort Worth Stockyards hosts a rodeo every weekend evening, while the major rodeos of the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo, the Calgary Stampede, the Pendleton Round-Up, and the Cheyenne Frontier Days draw tens of thousands of fans for each performance. And, of course, there’s the “national championship” for every rodeo cowboy and cowgirl, The National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas each December.

While rodeo stresses its western folk hero image as a genuinely American creation, in fact, it grew out of the practices of Spanish ranchers and their Mexican ranch hands known as vaqueros, as a mixture of cattle wrangling and bullfighting that dates back to the sixteenth-century conquistadors of Spain. The term “rodeo” (from the Spanish word rodear) means “to surround” or “go around,” and was first used in American English about 1834 to denote a “round up” of cattle.  

Modern day rodeo is a competitive sport practiced in the United States, Mexico, Central America, South America, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. It’s a sporting event that involves horses and other livestock, designed to test the skill and speed of cowboys and cowgirls, as well as that of horses bred to compete in rodeo events. American style professional rodeos generally comprise events divided into two basic categories: the timed events of tie-down roping, team roping, steer wrestling, and barrel racing where winners are determined by the fastest time, and the rough stock events of saddle bronc riding, bareback bronc riding, and bull riding where winners are determined by the highest score. Depending on sanctioning organization and region, other events such as breakaway roping, goat tying, and pole bending may also be a part of some rodeos. Other rodeos can have any nature of events, limited only by the imagination of the organizers.’ (Source)

Let’s continue - Tiffi finds some information about rodeo camp

Start at the beginning – Olivia wants to become a cowgirl