It can be over in the matter of seconds.
The rope breaks; the calf runs; the horse charges forward; and the rider throws their rope, aiming for a clean bell-collar catch.
You’ll see Buckley resident Krystal Pennington attempt such a feat during the breakaway roping event at the Enumclaw Pro Rodeo the weekend of Aug. 23 — and she’s nearing the last chance for her, and the dozens of other riders, to get onto the Top 12 list and go to finals in September.
It could be a nail biting affair, as she is currently ranked No. 11 and one slip-up can cost her a spot.
But as much as she may be nervous, she’s also clearly exhilarated by the prospect; this could be the first time she’ll be in the finals.
“I missed the finals by a couple hundred dollars last year, so making the finals this year would feel so validating to come back and get it done,” Pennington said.
Pennington started riding when she was eight years old; she didn’t come from a rodeo family, but her stepmom was a roper.
It was during one of her stepmom’s rodeos that Pennington saw breakaway roping for the first time.
“I absolutely loved it,” she said. “I loved the horsemanship of it.”
But it wasn’t until she became a legal adult that she started competing, using a horse, named Rocky, that she trained from the ground up when he was two years old.
“I’ve got the broken wrist to prove it,” she said. “… I was extremely blessed that he was good-minded and let me do all that.”
Pennington mostly rides Rocky now for practice, so you’ll likely see Creed, another home-trained horse, rushing toward that calf at the upcoming rodeo.
For the uninitiated, breakaway roping has more going on than “run fast, catch cow”.
Once a rider is ready, they give a signal to a chute operator, who releases the calf. The calf first has to break a small rope around its neck, which, in turn, releases a rope in front of the horse; if the horse moves forward before its barrier breaks, that’s a false start, and the rider is penalized a whopping ten seconds to their score.
When the calf breaks away, then it’s all about getting the rope (don’t, don’t, don’t call it a lasso) around its neck — anything but a clean catch is a disqualification.
Riders have only one chance to rope their calf as fast as possible; Pennington’s record is 2.1 seconds.
But here’s the real catch, and is one of the reasons why competing in rodeo is so difficult: just like in baseball, you’re going to miss most of the time.
“Statistically, you have to be OK with losing 70% of the time,” Pennington said. “And that’s where you have to truly love it.”
But unlike baseball players, rodeo competitors only make money if they do well — Pennington said most rodeos only give out cash for the best six or eight places, and prizes vary in size based on the rodeo’s ability to raise money after the cost of the rodeo is covered, and how many competitors there are.
Krystal Pennington with her horse, Creed. Photo by Gator Glass Photography
“If you’re breaking even, it’s a good day,” she continued; while half of her life is consumed by rodeo competitions and everything that comes with them, she’s also got a full time job as an insurance adjustor, which, thankfully, allows her to work on the road.
So if the odds are forever not in your favor — why do it at all?
There’s the love of the sport, and the horses, of course, but also, “We’re gambling addicts,” Pennington said, both joking and not. “… You’re literally betting on yourself every time you enter the rodeo.”
Like a gambler, Pennington studies her odds to a minuscule level; on her phone is a list of calves that she’s watched, over and over and over, to learn how they run — fast or slow, to the right or the left, and any other variable that could affect the event.
“And when you talk about the variables of your horse, the barrier, the calves — you’ll have a calf that was slow for the last person but for some reason it decides to run with you because the weather is a little colder… You’ll have calves that completely turn back at you,” she continued. “So driving for five, six hours to go to one rodeo and then have something go wrong… can be really mentally draining.”
With all this in mind, Pennington’s strategy is distilled to three aspects: score, ride, rope.
Score, she said, is the exact moment you ride out after a calf — it’s here that Pennington hopes her research pays off, because she doesn’t want a false start or be too slow.
Then there’s ride, which is how the horse responds to its rider. When Creed first started, there was a delay between her signal and when he started running; now he responds immediately, and Pennington has had to compensate for that change.
Pennington credits Creed for why she does well at breakaway roping.
“We know each other inside and out. My horses go out and give me the exact same shot every time, so that I can be extremely consistent,” she said. “I don’t win first very often, but I do place way more consistently. Slow and steady wins the race, and my horses allow me to do that.”
And finally, there’s rope, and as clichéd as it may sound, that rope has to be an extension of the rider’s arm.
”You should be competing on muscle memory,” Pennington said. “… When you start thinking about it too much, [that] is when you start making mistakes.”
And at 11th in the standings, Pennington can’t afford a mistake this late in the game.
Final placements are based on total prize earnings, and Pennington has earned nearly $4,200 this year.
But No. 12, Cidney Estes, is just $100 behind her, and No. 13, Rio Schmidt, is about $650 away from kicking Pennington down the list.
It can work the other way, too — if Jordan Minor, No. 10, or Adriene Steffen, No. 11, have a bad day, she can rise in the ranks.
And with the Enumclaw Pro Rodeo having one of the largest possible prizes, “Its the last opportunity to make a big move” in the standings, Pennington said.
This means the competition is fierce, but off the field, the community is tight-knit.
“It’s a really good group of girls,” Pennington said. “When someone goes and lays down a badass run, we all know how hard it is to lay down a run like that… I may only have a couple of friends there that I know personally, but you still have ten or 15 whoops and hollers because [all the other competitors] know how hard that was to do.”
And this is why Pennington shares her research, and other competitors share theirs with her.
“I want to win with you at your best,” she said. “I don’t want to withhold information — that’s not the kind of competitors we want to be.”
Finals will be held on Sept. 20 and 21 a the Oregon State Fair and Exposition Center in Salem, Oregon.
RODEO INFO
This year’s rodeo is Aug. 23 – 25, featuring among the athletes three live performers: Sammy Steele on Friday, from 4 to 6:30 p.m., and 9 to 11:30 p.m.; Leah Justine on Saturday, 4 to 6:30 p.m.; and Santa Poco on Sunday, 9 to 11:30 p.m.
Gates to the rodeo on Friday and Saturday open at 4 p.m., with the rodeo starting at 7.
The gates for Sunday open at 11 a.m. and the rodeo at 1 p.m.
Tickets are $25 for adults; $10 for youth from ages 6 – 12; and $20 for military, vets, and seniors. Tickets are for specific days to the rodeo — head to rodeoticket.com/rodeos/enumclaw-pro-rodeo/2024/tickets to purchase.
