Bullriding and Beer

Stefan and I went to the Greg Potter Slate River Ranch Classic Professional Bull Rider's Enterprise Tour last night at the Richmond Coliseum. Our seats were row D - not quite close enough to be in danger if a bull came charging over the side, but definitely close enough!

For the next 2 1/2 hours, we were treated to world-class entertainment. We had a rip-roaring good time! Neither of us have been to see Bullriders in all their live glory, but those cowboys are really something. So were the bulls. They didn't have any of that I-don't-care-about-putting-on-a-good-show attitude that we experienced at the Soul 2 Soul tour. And we were relieved about that. The bulls did what they did - throw rider after rider and stun the crowd with their sheer massiveness. I wish we'd brought some A-1 sauce! While the bulls were shorter than the horses (there were 3 riders equipped with lassos who helped "guide" wayward bulls back towards the chamber after throwing its rider), their legs were extremely stocky and heavy-set, with thick bodies and necks. Beautiful creatures when viewed from the safety and distance of Row D.

The crowd was definitely a different flavor than the Faith Hill/Tim McGraw crowd. Although both shows attract cowboy/cowgirl type people, the folks at the PBR were the serious kind of cowboy - the ones who long to wrangle up their own good fun with their 4-legged creatures. The man sitting next to us was sporting a cast - a reward from being thrown by his bronco. We felt strangely at home with this crowd. We didn't feel out of place, and we enthusiastically threw ourselves into the excitement going on around us, although the excitement was more low-key than the concert the week before.

We got there about 40 minutes before the show started, found our seats, and then went to grab a bite to eat and a beer. What's a rodeo without a beer? The coliseum floor had been converted from a concrete slab to a dirt ring and a bunch of holding pens at one end. Each pen was just large enough for a bull to stand, while the rider climbed over the pen and onto the bull's back. The program came with a list of the 40 riders who were competing that night, along with the name of the bull they were to be riding. We figured the show would be quite long, but it went by surprisingly quick. Each rider is trying to stay on the bull for 8 seconds. If he stays on that long, then he qualifies for the next round, where the top ten riders compete for the number 1 spot. The goal of the second round is to stay on for 8 seconds, and the bulls selected for the second round were picked for their throwing ability. Even out of 40 contestents, less than 10 were able to hold on for 8 seconds, so a couple of guys were randomly selected to fill up the 10 spots in the championship round.

I don't know how to explain how much fun we had, but we left that evening, with hoarse voices from all the shouting and yee-haws we did. Stefan will be posting a bunch of pictures, that will probably be exciting only to us. It really is something to see in person. Something gets lost in the translation of the photos. All in all, although we were tired and didn't feel all that enthusiastic about driving all the way up to Richmond for the show, we were really glad we went, and it will go down in our memory book as one of those times to look back fondly on. It's really great to try something new and different every now and then - we still surprise ourselves with what we find we really enjoy. And guaranteed, the next time the rodeo comes to town, we will be there!