It is in their blood.
That is how both Chris Rogers and Colleen Branden characterized why they are competing on the Canadian Senior Professional Rodeo Association (CSPRA) tour at a time of their lives that many people don’t associate with rodeo.
The CSPRA was founded more than 30 years ago to give older competitors a chance to participate in the sport they love.
For the most part, CSPRA events are just like a traditional rodeo, with the exception being the age of the contestants.
Athletes compete in eight different events – from saddle bronc and bull riding to steer wrestling – but to compete in the CSPRA you must be at least 40 years old and there is no upper limit.
Rogers, who lives in the Mosside area, said like most people on the circuit he started rodeoing in his late teens.
“I tried my hand at riding bulls before moving on to roping calves and steer wrestling,” he said.
As he got older, he eventually gave up rodeoing to start a family and pursue his career as a professional pipefitter.
And even though he gave up participating, he was always around it.
“My kids were all involved in high school and college rodeoing,” he said, adding he credits one of his children for getting him back into the sport.
When he was 60, his daughter Dawn Marie Branden, bought him a horse and he started team roping.
In the team roping event, a steer is released from the chute and a team of two people, on their own horses attempt to rope the steer which is running loose in the rodeo arena.
The first roper, known as a header, which is Roger’s position, ropes the front of the steer, usually around its horns, but sometimes as low as its neck. Once the steer is caught, the header then wraps his or her rope around the horn on his saddle and then uses his horse to turn the steer to its left. While the header is doing this the heeler attempts to rope both of the steer’s back feet. It is a timed event and the team with the fastest time wins the event.
“I rope at Leonard’s, Ronald’s and David’s place [Schmidt] and I have a lot of fun,” Rogers said, adding about four years ago he started to take it more seriously and enter CSPRA events, starting with the ones in Barrhead and Mayerthorpe.
Most of the time while on tour this year Rogers teams up with fellow Barrhead area resident Betty Adams.
“Unfortunately, I still have to work, so I can’t go to as many as I would like,” Rogers said, adding he has 55 cattle on his own ranch to take care of plus he still works as a pipe welder.
As for how long the 70 year-old Rogers plans to continue rodeoing, he said he isn’t sure.
“I don’t have any plans to quit,” he said.
In fact, besides team roping in CSPRA events, Rogers finds time to compete on the pro-am circuit in the team roping events with his grandsons, Grady and Quentin Branden.
“I mean how many people get the opportunity to rope with their grandsons?” he asked, adding it is really a family sport. Out of his seven grandchildren, six of them are involved in rodeo. “Actually the last time I went out roping, my 13 year-old granddaughter beat me. How much better can it get than that?”
Like Rogers, Branden, a Vega native who competes as a header in the team roping with Darcy Miller, as well as the breakaway roping events, credits her family for getting her interested in rodeoing.
“I grew up with it,” she said. “My dad [Jim Branden] got us [brother Neil] rodeoing when we were just little.”
When Branden first started competing in rodeos, she said she gravitated to barrel racing, but as time went on she knew she wouldn’t be competing, at least on a regular basis. “That and the fact that I guess roping was in our blood with our dad having us rope all the time.”
As for how Branden got involved in the senior’s circuit, she said it wouldn’t have happened without the help of her partner, Darcy Miller.
About six years ago, someone at a CSPRA finals event invited Miller to compete in the steer wrestling event because they didn’t have enough competitors.
Miller accepted, but as a consequence he had to purchase his CSPRA card for the next season.
“He then asked me to come along, saying the events were a lot of fun,” she said.
And so far Miller agrees, adding one of the reasons is because it a more relaxed atmosphere in part because of the reduced travel schedule. “I just want to thank my dad for getting us involved in rodeo and to my travelling partners the Millers [Darcy and Jackie] because without them I wouldn’t be having all this fun.”
