Competing in the Bareback category of the Calgary Stampede, Carbon boy Cole Goodine competes against the best of the best.

Riding from July 7 to July 10 in the ‘A’ pool, Goodine was able to squeeze $3,000 out of the event.
Within the sport of Bareback riding, control and flare are a cowboy’s two favourite assets.

“The way to get the best marks is to show control but exposure while you’re still in control. So the longer the spurs stroke, the more wild it looks while you maintain control,” explained Goodine.

Goodine split his winnings three out of the four days. On the final day, he was able to take a decent amount of pay for his re-ride.

“The money got split up a lot, I never got one full cheque for myself.”

Initially, Goodine started team roping and calf roping before discovering his love for bareback riding.

Goodine got into the sport after he and a buddy tried it on a dare. After that, there was no going back.

“I was hooked as soon as I got thrown through the air,” said Goodine.

Rodeo runs in the family.

“My dad was a bull rider and my mom was a barrel racer and my grandpa was a bareback rider and my other grandpa was a calf roper”.

“My mom literally planned me and my sisters’ births so that she could still barrel race and not miss out on anything,” said Goodine. “I was born in the saddle.”

As of this past week, three generations of Goodine’s have now participated in Stampede.

“Unreal, it’s pretty exciting. It’s always been a dream just to have my dad there with me.”

Goodine got himself into ‘a bit of a wreck’ on the last day.

“The horse came down on me and then once I got out of it, I got offered a re-ride and I was about to get on the re-ride when my dad was waiting there behind the chutes to help me out – make sure I was okay.”

He rode the re-ride with ease, earning himself a cheque.

This is Goodine’s first year fully committed to the sport after being laid-off from work. “I thought I might as well go for it.”

This year he has been fighting with a number of minor to serious injuries due to the sport. He has a problem with the disk in his back as well as hip, rib problems, thumb dislocation, and a bone was put out in his foot.

Goodine was ranked #1 in Canada last year until the end. He continually pushes himself to do better to compete with the best, year in and year out.

“I typically train three to four hours a day, five to six days a week. I try to stay healthy and strong enough to compete with the best in the world. We’re all pushing harder and harder to be better and better and pushing the human limits.

"In order to compete against the best, you have to push that a little bit more all the time,” said Goodine.

When asked how it felt to compete on the world stage, Goodine smiled and fervently said “There’s not really words to describe it. It’s unreal to just be in the same category that they are.”

Out of the four draws for horses, two were great, and two not so much.

“There were two that didn’t work out as well as I had hoped.”

The first day, he got a horse that was difficult to ride but was able to regain himself on the next two.

“So I got a couple horses that really suited me and a couple horses that did not but I managed to fight through it and I’m really proud of myself for that.”

Despite the multiple injuries, Goodine has much more fight left in him for the rest of the rodeo season ahead.

“There’s a lot of rodeo left and I’m feeling foxy.”

Big Valley star Zeke Thurston claims his third top win for saddle bronc from the Calgary Stampede on Sunday, July 16.
With an outstanding score of 90 points on Timely Delivery during the opening round on Sunday, Zeke was able to rise above in the final four.
On his final ride of the day in the final four, Thurston rode the famous Northcott Macza horse ‘Get Smart’, netting him the $100,000 win.
“Every jump I thought I was going to get bucked off,” puffed Thurston, moments after his thrilling 92 point ride. “That horse bucks so hard. He’s probably only 800 pounds, but that’s one of the strongest horses I’ve ever been on.”
A cowboy is only as good as the horse underneath him.
“Honestly, that horse could buck you off any day of the week. I was just lucky to stay on.”
Following the three-peat trend, this is not the first nor the last time Zeke and Get Smart have encountered each other. Ironically enough, the two horses and the Big Valley local worked together to win the Ponoka Stampede two weeks ago and plan to see each other again next weekend.

Zeke’s championship score was just a half point higher than the 91.5 turned in by his friend Layton Green on Wild Cherry moments before.
“That was pretty special to be riding against your buddy that you’ve known since you were eight years old,” insisted Zeke. “We grew up riding steers together, came up through high school rodeo, learned to ride broncs together, and now to be competing against him at Calgary, it’s pretty cool. He made an awesome ride. I knew I was going to have to do something to set myself apart. Turns out I had the buckier horse, was all.”
Zeke, who just turned 23 on Saturday, hasn’t thought too much yet about making his mark in history as the first saddle bronc rider to notch three consecutive wins with the $100,000 paydays attached.
“That’s crazy to me. You know, a lot of guys will go their whole careers and maybe never win this rodeo and to win it three years in a row, that’s unbelievable,” Zeke explained.
Family, especially Zeke’s mother Lynda, was beyond proud to watch her own blood make history.
“It feels pretty exciting, it actually took a little longer this time to sink in I think,” Lynda laughed. “It was a pretty great round of bronc riding. It was awesome to watch four outstanding horses and four good cowboys and yeah, it was close but I’m really proud of the ride that Zeke made. It was a heck of a ride.”
Thurston’s takehome from Stampede was $110,000, with the cash he won earlier in the week; while Green gets the $25,000 bonus to go with his earlier $13,000 take.
Taking the third place bonus of $15,000 for a 90 point ride on Stampede Warrior was Taos Muncy. Sterling Crawley also received a $10,000 bonus for his 89 point ride on Magic Carpet in the Showdown round.

Four Badlands Rugby Football Club (RFC) players joined the Bow Valley Barbarians, also known as the ‘Ba-Baas’, for their game on Friday evening against the Calgary Saracens on July 14.

The game was held on field one at Calgary Rugby Park, the same field where just last month the Canadian national team hosted Georgia.

“Imagine centre court at Wimbledon, well this would be the Rugby equivalent in Calgary, not bad for our first game,” remarked April Harrison, a club member.

The weather was polar opposite to that game, with clear skies and temperatures soaring to 27 degrees for the 6:30 p.m. kick off.

The Ba-Baas, a developmental team out of Bow Valley RFC, welcome players from multiple teams that might be new and in need of some game experience.

Six Badlands players from both the Senior Men’s and Senior Women’s teams, attended training at Bow Valley on Thursday ahead of the Men’s game.

Short enough players for a full side, the Saracens agreed to a ‘friendly’ game of 10’s, playing 25 minutes each way.

For three of the four Badlands players, this was their first ever game of Rugby, but the training had clearly paid off as two of them scored Trys! You score a ‘try’ when you move the ball into the in-goal of the other team and “ground” the ball. That is the only place a try is scored.

The Ba-Baas put in a great effort and a last minute Try from Dustin Clark, one of the Badlands boys, brought the score to within one point.

“Despite our inexperience and a narrow loss, the Badlands players fit into the Barbarians side comfortably. The other three guys have never played rugby before and they performed well beyond my expectations,” said Andrew Beattie, Badlands RFC player/coach.

“The experience the four of us gained at the training session and in the game on Friday is immeasurable," he added.

The other Badlands Try came from ‘Left Wing’, Brady Kaiser, who showed his pace when he saw a gap in the Saracens’ defence and sprinted for the try line early in the first half.

“I was a little wary of joining the team at first because I literally didn’t know a thing about the sport but the guys and gals in Drumheller and Cochrane really make it fun,” he said. “It’s a great chance to get out for some exercise and forget about the weekly grind for a night. I’m super excited to keep playing rugby for years to come.”

Salen Prasad rounded off the Badlands cohort and put in a resounding effort at ‘Loosehead Prop’.

“I couldn’t be more proud of this group of rugby newcomers that left it all out on the field,” said Salen Prasad. “The Bow Valley squad welcomed us with open arms and even though we came up one point short, we won’t be hanging our heads anytime soon! There’s a big future for rugby here in the Badlands.” 

Badlands players are planning to join the Ba-Baas for more games in the coming weeks. Beattie encouraged people from Drumheller and the surrounding communities to think about joining in Canada’s fastest growing sport.

“We’ve already had a couple of clubs ask if we’d be interested in setting up an exhibition game. We get new players along to training most weeks and if we could get say, five more, we could for sure do that,” encouraged Beattie.