A hundred or more cowboys, cowgirls, and cowkids will be showing off their roping, riding, and racing skills in this year's Rainmaker rodeo competition on May 24 to 26.
This year is the 57th annual Rainmaker Festival, which is organized by the Kinsmen Club of St. Albert and takes place at the Riel Recreation Park.
While many St. Albertans might just have their eyes on the Rainmaker's concerts or the rides, the Kinsmen Club's rodeo director Dave Bergsma is hoping folks make a point of taking in some rodeo action over the weekend.
“The people that ride in the rodeo do it because they love it,” Bergsma said. “They don't do it to make money.”
“They put their heart and soul into everything they do for it, so to come out and watch them give it their all, to me, it's a very amazing feeling to watch that.”
In all there will be three rodeo performances over the weekend, with the first scheduled for Friday at 6:30 p.m., and the last scheduled for 1:00 p.m. on Sunday afternoon.
The rodeo events taking place this year include junior pony races and bull riding, barrel racing, team roping, tie down roping, steer wrestling, saddle bronc riding, bareback riding, and bull riding.
Junior pony racing involves two youngsters working together to get one of them up and on a wild pony for (hopefully) eight seconds.
Barrel racing, which is dominated by women at the professional and university or college level, is a riding event where the rider is tasked with manoeuvring their horse in a cloverleaf pattern around barrels as quickly as possible.
Team roping, which Bergsma confided is his favourite event, involves two competitors working together to throw a rope around the head and heels of a steer, who gets a brief head start out of the gate, as quickly as possible.
“You got to try and get that rope around the head and the rope around both back legs of a moving steer all from horseback,” Bergsma said. “It takes so much skill between two riders.”
“Your timing and everything just has to be perfect, so it's definitely a well-honed skill.”
Another roping event taking place during the rodeo is tie down roping, an individual event where competitors must rope a runaway calf before demounting their horse and tying three of the calf's legs together. To be a successful attempt, the tie must hold for six seconds.
Steer wrestling is another event that involves a swift demount, but in this competition the competitor is riding alongside a steer which they then jump onto and wrestle to the ground by the horns. In order to stop the time, the steer must be on its side with all four legs extended.
The remaining events all involve bucking bulls and horses.
Saddle bronc riding and bareback riding are quite similar, although the gear used in each is different.
Bareback riding, as the name implies, involves riding horses without a saddle, and instead hanging on with one hand to a suitcase-like leather handle attached to a strap that's tied to the horse. If that doesn't sound hard enough, riders must start by having their ankles (and spurs) above the horse's shoulders, which means riders are leaning quite far back.
Saddle bronc riding, on the other hand, involves riders sitting horseback on a saddle but instead of a handle to hang onto, saddle bronc riders hang onto a thick rein attached to the horse's halter or headcollar with one hand.
Although the goal of saddle bronc and bareback riding is to hang on for eight seconds, saddle bronc riders are also scored based on style, which is judged heavily by how closely the rider matches the rhythm of the bucking bronco.
Bull riding, likely the most well known rodeo event, involves riders gripping a rope with one hand as they try to ride a bucking bull for eight seconds.
Bergsma explained that each rodeo performance will be about two hours, and there will be a maximum of 12 competitors in each event. He did explain that there are usually more than 12 entries in each event though, however, due to time constraints, any events that have extra entries will be featured in the slack.
In rodeos, “slack” refers to the time outside of scheduled performances wherein overflow contestants compete. For example, Bergsma said the slack for the Rainmaker rodeo will be at 9:30 a.m. on the Saturday.
Rainmaker attendees can watch the slack, however, Bergsma said it's likely the slack period will wrap-up prior to the event grounds opening that morning at 10:30 a.m..
