Marcus Michaelis had just watched his friend and traveling partner, JC Bean get knocked out by a bull and carried out on a stretcher. But that didn’t negatively affect his ride.
Michaelis significantly improved his chances on qualifying for his second straight a href="http://www.prorodeo.com/" target="_blank">National Finals Rodeo with the short go and average victory at Monday’s finale at the Ellensburg Rodeo.
The victory came after Bean’s injury a few minutes before.
The longer you have to wait the worse it is,”
Michaelis said. “You want to hurry up and go at it.“
“(JC’s) a tough guy,”
he continued. “I knew he’d be OK.”
Bean is OK according to announcements at the Ellensburg Rodeo arena and Michaelis, ranked outside of the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association’s top 15 in 21st this week, racked up $6,642 in prize money (85, 88, 173 on two) to improve his season earnings to not quite $57,000. He’s still going to be out of the top 15, but he’s that much closer.
“I needed to make a move and this is a good place to start because the rodeo pays good and the (Xtreme Bulls) bull riding pays good. I’ve got to start stringing some rides together.”
One guy who did a good job with his piggin’ string is Matt Shiozawa. Shiozawa is in a similar position as Michaelis, as he is on the outside looking into the top 15 in tie-down roping. Coming into the week, the Chubbuck, Idaho, cowboy was about $6,000 out of the top 15 and he made nearly $5,600 at Ellensburg alone.
Shiozawa was leading the average on two head coming into Monday, exactly the same position he was in last year. Only this year, the final outcome was much better.
Shiozawa needed a 9.3-second tie to win the average over the world leader Josh Peek and that’s exactly what he got, despite the fact that his calf fell down before Shiozawa could flank him, costing a tenth of a second or two.
“It takes a little time and a couple more steps to get it done,”
he said. “That’s why I cut it close.”
Close or not, Shiozawa’s 26.5 on three head was a tenth better than Peek for the win.
After three rounds, there was no separating Luke Branquinho and Ken Lewis for the win in steer wrestling. Both bulldoggers have the NFR made and both were happy with splitting the average, but they both thought they underperformed.
“I knew I was beat from the get go,”
Branquinho said. “(My steer) left and ran more than I thought he would. When you miss the barrier like that (slow out of the barrier) … I was just happy (the steer) made up for it on the ground.”
Lewis echoed Branquinho on his own run.
“I should probably have been faster,”
he said. “They’ve been 4.3 on him twice and I was 4.7. But I’ll take what I can get.”
What they both got was 13.6 on three head. Branquinho came out with $5,153 as he won more money in the first and second go than Lewis who pocketed $3,837.
The trip to Ellensburg might help erase some of the bad luck earlier this summer for Sheena Robbins. The Fresno, Calif., barrel racer’s horse suffered a back injury in Cody, Wyo., this July taking both of them out of competition for a while. Because of that Robbins fell out of contention for the NFR and came into Ellensburg ranked 47th in the world this year with less than $20,000 won. However, she and her horse were in a groove this week as they won the first go, split third in the second go and again placed third in Monday’s short go to win the average in 52.33 seconds, nearly three-tenths of a second ahead of Sherry Cervi.
“I’m trying to stay in the top 50 so I can get into Houston next year,”
she said. Well, $6,988 here this week will probably guarantee that.
“I really didn’t think (my horse) would be able to come back this year,”
she said.
Consider it quite the comeback.
The same could be said for bareback rider Will Lowe, although he hasn’t gone anywhere, he just hasn’t won Ellensburg since his record-setting rookie year in 2002 when he was 19 years old.
Lowe split the first go win in the bareback riding with Cody DeMers with an 86. Monday, he rode Calgary Stampede’s Mad Money for 83 points for 169 on two, one point ahead of Josi Young.
“I just tried to stay on,”
he said. “That horse bucked really hard. He cranked me around the corner real good. I did about all I could do. There’s a lot of power in that horse.”
Lowe earned nearly $8,200 for his two rides, which will move him one place up in the world standings in fourth, but with more than $92,000 in the bank this year, it certainly helps close the gap between him and the world leader, Steven Dent ($122,000), who left Ellensburg without a dime this weekend.
Two ropers, however, won quite a few dimes this week in Ellensburg. Team roping partners Chad Masters and Michael Jones started their week splitting $10,200 at the WestStar open team roping on Wednesday and then won the second and short go’s at the rodeo on their way to winning the average and another $6,950. Not bad for a couple of guys who two weeks ago started roping together again after a layoff. The duo was leading the average coming into Monday, but the two roped the same as they always would.
“None of that really makes honestly any difference,”
Jones said. “We had a good steer and we roped him the way we were supposed to.“
“Chad said we needed an eight to win (over Hermiston’s Matt Funk and Benton City’s Bucky Campbell), but you forget about that.”
Obviously, since they roped a 5.2 to really win with 15.6 on three. Both cowboys are in the top five of the heading and heeling standings, but this will certainly get them closer to No. 1. In fact, while results weren’t available by press time, Jones probably overtook Randon Adams for the top spot in the heeling standings.
Like Masters and Jones, saddle bronc rider Dusty Hausauer already has the NFR made, but his $7,432 earned here keeps the momentum going through the end of the regular season on Sept. 30. Calgary Stampede’s Fearless Warrior bucked Hausauer to an 86-point ride for 170 on two.
“The horse had a couple more moves than I’ve seen before,”
he admitted, but was thrilled with the payday. “You feel really fortunate just to place at big rodeos like this.”
Ellensburg paid out a shade more than $277,000 this year. Add the $50,000 from Xtreme Bulls and the payout reached more than $325,000. Earnings from this year’s inaugural Blowout Broncs didn’t count toward the world standings, but, “they count toward the pocketbook,”
winner Bryce Miller said.
