It's rodeo time!

Last night we made our way over to the Norris-Penrose Event Center for finals night of the Pikes Peak or Bust Rodeo.

The Pikes Peak Rangerettes always start the fun.  They're a precision mounted drill team.  Jillian once thought about trying out for the team, but thank goodness that didn't really happen.  These girls and their horses travel all over to various rodeos and other events.

We've been going to this rodeo for years.  It used to be a small time rodeo that let every cowboy around enter if they wanted and it would go on for hours and hours..  For a few years it moved it into the World Arena and tried to make it all flashy with fireworks, guest performers, and all that jazz.  Now it's a qualifying event for the National Finals Rodeo so it's more serious now and it's televised.  Not even the clown gets to come out and tell his jokes.  No more shenanigans.

The rodeo also used to invite any rodeo queen who wanted to attend.  Now it's only the Girl of the West, her aid, and Miss Rodeo America pictured above.  This young woman is a heck of horsewoman.  That horse was wanted to buck and misbehave all night.

The mounted guard from Ft. Carson always presents the colors.  Last night a woman from the Navy said both the Canadian and American national anthems.  The rodeo benefits the military in the area so there's always a big military presence.  In addition to Ft. Carson, we also have Peterson Space Force Base, Schriever AFB, the AF Academy and Cheyenne Mountain Air Station.

The rodeo has all the typical events starting with the bareback bronco riding.  

It was hot and we were packed in like sardines.  That woman sitting next to Mary was a real chatterbox until the subject turned to how much she loves Trump.  She said that the world was laughing at our old president with dementia and then Mary said Trump wasn't exactly a stable genius himself.  From then on the conversation was cordial and the woman shut up which was a good thing.  Why do Trumpers always need to express their political opinions to complete strangers?  I was proud of Mary of speaking back respectfully to the woman and then dropping the subject.

There was mutton busting.  Mary and I got a good laugh at the sheep blindly following the herd while being guided by a sly dog.  Have you been watching the January 6th hearings, people?  Time to open your eyes and take those blinders off.  (I love that my blog is now private.)

We had our fill of junk food--nachos, pretzel and here's Mary finishing up her dad's turkey leg.

There's a new event for the women in rodeo now...breakaway roping.  It's not as exciting as the men's events but it's nice they've added a second event for women.  Hopefully this trend will continue into the future.

I still love the barrel racing.  It's my next favorite event after the bull riding.

The bull riding rounded out the evening.  It was a complete sweep in favor of the bulls.  Not a single cowboy made it to eight seconds.

No more intermission entertainment like we've seen in the past like the bison that was trained or the soldiers that were trained at a local facility here to ride horseback when the Afghan war first broke out.

And definitely no more foolishness like the wild cow milking that Irv and his teammates completed in 10 years ago.  He's sad that he's no longer listed as a rodeo champion on the rodeo's website anymore.

Like I said, it's all a little more serious these days.