King of the Cowboys by Ty Murray & Steve Eubanks

Author:Ty Murray & Steve Eubanks
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: SOC035000
Publisher: ATRIA BOOKS
Published: 2003-07-15T00:00:00+00:00

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FOR A LONG TIME after losing Lane, nothing seemed natural or normal. The atmosphere on the road was thick with grief. We didn’t joke the way we used to, and the travel and preparation seemed more like work than it had before. Of course we all went back to riding, because that’s who we were. We all knew the risks; we always had. You don’t climb on a bull without knowing you could be seriously injured or killed. That was part of the business, something we all knew in advance, but something we never talked about. If you dwelled on getting hurt, you might as well hang up your spurs. Danger was a big part of the game, but it was also something you compartmentalized, something you pushed to the back of your mind when it came time to get into the chutes. Now we’d lost a friend, and the risks of our sport had become very real to all of us.

Everybody handles grief differently. Focusing on each ride, each event, with a 100 percent intensity kept my mind sharp and helped me get through the rough times. The weekend after we buried Lane, I was back in Wyoming riding in the Gillette Rodeo, where I finished second in the saddle bronc riding and won the bareback. Sure, it was tough to go back, but it never occurred to me not to. It was even harder watching Cody, Jim, and Tuff cope, but we all pressed ahead. Lane would have kicked our asses if we’d slowed down or taken time off because of him. Nobody pretended it was easy, but we did what we had to do. We were cowboys, just like Lane.

Like a lot of tragedies, Lane’s death focused a spotlight on our sport, one that had the unintended consequence of showing people what kind of athletes we were. Despite the best efforts of champions like Larry Mahan to bring our sport into the mainstream, cowboys still weren’t looked at as athletes, and rodeo wasn’t considered a sport to a big bulk of people. Lane’s death shone a spotlight on the physical and mental demands as well as the dangers of our game. Suddenly, the sports world looked at us a little differently.

I tried to tune out all the distractions during that time. If I could remain focused on the task at hand, making each ride the center of my mental and physical universe, I could not only get back into a routine, I could also get through the tough feelings. That attitude and focus paid off in terms of my riding. By Labor Day I was second in the all-around standings, a thousand dollars behind Butch Myers. Two weeks later those roles were reversed. I led the all-around on September 19 with $84,044, Butch was second with $82,465, and Clay O’Brien Cooper was third with $76,967. The three of us would jockey back and forth throughout the rest of the season. A few weeks I would lead, then Butch or Clay would have a good weekend and grab the lead away from me.

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