A painful parting of the rodeo ways

Barrel racing will have two rival sponsoring leagues in 2007

Sara Burnett, Rocky Mountain News

Published October 28, 2006 at midnight

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FORT COLLINS - Kachena Lesmeister was just a little girl growing up in the shadow of Devils Tower when her mom put a pillow on her horse's saddle and plopped her on top.

It wasn't long before Lesmeister, like her mom, was running barrels - a kind of horse race, rodeo-style, in which horse and rider circle three barrels and return to the starting line as fast as they can without knocking any barrels on their sides.

In an arena historically dominated by men, it is the one contest reserved for the ladies, a mix of speed and grace and beauty.

And for women like Lesmeister - who recently quit her job as a high school special education teacher to compete full time on the barrel racing circuits - it is addictive.

"If I didn't have it, I don't know what I would do with my life," the Gillette, Wyo., resident said shortly after finishing fifth at the Qualifier at the Fort rodeo in Fort Collins earlier this month.

"I don't know any different."

Changing world

But barrel racing, as Lesmeister and the rest of the rodeo world know it, is about to change.

For better or worse. Like it or not.

And many don't.

Much to the dismay of some members of the Women's Professional Rodeo Association - the group that has sanctioned barrel racing since 1948 - the men-only Professional Rodeo Cowboy Association is slated to debut its own barrel racing subsidiary for women next month.

The creation of the new league, called Professional Women's Barrel Racing, has blown the lid off a long-simmering dispute between the men's and women's organizations.

In September, that dispute moved from the organizations' Colorado Springs-based boardrooms to the federal courthouse, when the women's group filed a lawsuit accusing the men of trying to monopolize the industry and "raid" their membership.

The PRCA - men-only for seven decades - wasn't interested in barrel racing until it started to turn a healthy profit, WPRA President Jymmy Kay Davis says.

The PRCA counters that the women's group wasn't paying its fair share for participating in PRCA rodeos.

Despite attempts, no compromise was reached.

So next month, when the 2007 season kicks off in Inverness, Fla., the new league will be running the barrel race. Many say it will mark the end of an era - one that has seen women largely as invited guests at men's rodeos.

While the WPRA will continue to exist, and the committees that organize rodeos will have their choice about which barrel racing group to use, the women's organization will be forced to reinvent itself, Davis admitted.

Reality TV show?

Just how it will do that is still under wraps, though Davis said the suggestion of a reality TV show about a barrel racing circuit is an "interesting" one.

Some barrel racers, like Susan Burford, see the change as a good thing.

"Right now, (the rodeos) don't have to have us," said Burford, who grew up in Nebraska but now attends the University of Wyoming and is hard at work on her dream of qualifying for the National Finals Rodeo, the national championship held each fall in Las Vegas.

"If it's PRCA, they have to have us."

Burford plans to join the new organization because only points accumulated at barrel races sanctioned by the new group will count toward qualifying for the National Finals Rodeo. She hopes to get there within two or three years, and says she has the horse, Slick, to do it.

Susie Ford, a Greeley cowgirl who produces barrel races with her daughter, Courtney, and is married to a five-time world champion bareback rider, said she expects qualifying for the National Finals will be the deciding factor for many women.

"That's every little girl's dream," said Ford, who started barrel racing herself at the age of five. "(The PRCA) is where the money's at."

Megan Zion, a barrel racer from Idalia, Colo., who met her husband, a calf roper, at the Steamboat Springs rodeo five years ago, hopes the change doesn't mean the demise of the women's organization.

Standing outside the couple's trailer at the Fort Collins rodeo, Zion described the women's group as an "amazing organization" that helped all of today's barrel racers.

Rite of passage

Over the years, it became a rite of passage for young barrel racers to get their WPRA card as soon as possible upon turning 18, she said - much like a 16-year-old rushing out to pass her driver's test.

Yet Zion plans to forgo the WPRA next year and join the PRCA's new league. It will make traveling to rodeos with her husband, Corey, much easier, she said.

Zion also agreed with Lesmeister - and Lesmeister's mother - that after years of having separate barrel racing entities in a sometimes uncomfortable arrangement, the change was inevitable.

"It's been a long time coming," Zion said.

Even some cowboys say bringing the women under the PRCA umbrella probably is long overdue.

"There's quite a few fans," said Josh Johnson, a 26-year-old bull rider from Douglas, Wyo., who smiled and said most of the interaction between the bull riders and the barrel racers occurs "only if we're lucky."

Johnson said he didn't realize just how popular barrel racing was until the rift occurred and everyone started talking about it.

And that conversation, people on all sides say, hasn't been pretty.

Rumors have spread across the Internet and the rodeo circuits. People have taken sides, and confusion has lingered.

Many, like Ford, are disappointed with how it played out.

"It's sad that it had to come to this, because I don't feel that it had to," she said. "(The two organizations) dug their heels in."

burnetts@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5343

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