Danger and safety

The rough stock riding events are usually considered the most dangerous in rodeo. All of the events (like most sports) offer the opportunity to get hurt, but in the timed events, the injuries are usually milder. Calf ropers, steer wrestlers and goat tyers injure their knees and ankles jumping off horses; ropers sprain their wrists and fingers when the rope snaps taut, pole benders and barrel racers run the risk of falling off horses.

While any of these can be serious, the rough stock riders run the greatest risks. The point of their events is to NOT be thrown from the back of an animal - which means that a lot of them are. Once thrown, there's always the chance that the animal will step on you, especially if you get hung up in the various things that attach you to the animal you're riding. This happens a lot to bareback riders, who work their riding glove into the loop of their rigging as tightly as they can. (The rigging is a small leather pad that straps to the bronc. There's a loop on top that the cowboy jams a glove into so that he can hang on.)

Hung up in the rigging is a bad, bad place to be. The horse is often running wildly at this point, may still be bucking, and doesn't care if he steps on you or not. The first time I was at the NHSRA finals, this happened to a cowboy, and I can still close my eyes and hear the sound of the horse's hooves as he galloped around the arena, the right front hoof striking the cowboy every other step.

Yesterday morning, one of the bull riders got injured. He met the bull with his head coming down from a leap, and was then tossed about for a bit before being thrown clear, unconscious before he came off. The EMTs worked on him and then loaded him into an ambulance; he was taken to the hospital, still unconscious. He's been through surgery now, and has a guardedly hopeful prognosis, mainly due to the presence of Dr. Ted Maurin, a world class neurosurgeon, at Farmington.

Some people say that the rough stock riding events are too dangerous and should be banned. I'm not sure I agree; I hate seeing one of the kids get injured, but sports, all sports, include the element of danger. People die playing football, and baseball, and even golf; people are terribly injured playing sports all the time. I don't understand bull riders and what makes them get on a gigantic obstreperous beast, but they seem to like it. They talk about the rush they get from it, about the joy of making a successful ride, and they sound like skydivers. Should skydiving be banned as well?

No. I think it's important to work for safety as much as possible, especially at the high school level. (Like it or not, once people turn eighteen, they're legally adults, and should be allowed to make decisions and live with the consequences of those decisions.) Something that I like a lot is the increas in the number of riders wearing helmets to ride bulls and other rough stock; helmets often prevent injuries, both directly by cushioning the rider's head, and indirectly by keeping them from being knocked out. A conscious cowboy is often better able to control his fall ...

If I had a son who wanted to bull ride, I'd grit my teeth and let him. I'd buy him the best protective vest and helmet that he could have, and I'd never let him enter an event that disallowed such safety gear. I'd pray every time he got on a bull. But I'd let him ride.