Last Thursday night saw a western staple return to Cochrane as the fifth annual Foothills Bucking Horse Futurity took to the Cochrane Lions Rodeo Grounds.
The event – organized by Jimmy Richards – showcases future bucking horses with riders from Alberta, British Columbia, and Saskatchewan taking part and 10 stock contractors bringing three horses, each between three to five years old.
This year, around $10,000 in prize money was dished out with Rod Hay and Jeff McKay picking up $2,800 for best contractor and Cole Ashbacker taking first place among the riders with $1,200.
“It was a pretty good turn out this year,” Richards said “Attendance was what we thought it would be, but sponsorship was down.”
Due to the recent economic downturn, many of Richards’ usual sponsors – who are in the construction business – had to back out because of a drying up of oil patch contracts (the bulk of their business). This forced Richards to take a good hit for this year’s edition of the event.
“Normally, I add $5,000 to the futurity myself, but this year because of several factors I could only do $2,500.”
Modelled after similar events in the United States (where they are very popular), the futurity was the first and only one of its kind in Canada for the past four years, but now there is a second one in Craven, Sask.
That being said, Richards feels events like this are too much of a “niche” to really take off in the area.
“Originally this seemed like something I could do myself,” he said. “I didn’t want to put on an actual rodeo, so I thought this could be a good alternative.”
Holding the event on a Thursday during the Calgary Stampede also proved beneficial as people are struck with cowboy fever.
“That has definitely given it an added interest,” Richards said. “It gives people who don’t want to drive into Calgary something to do. We also hold it on a Thursday because there’s no other rodeos going on that particular day, allowing us to get more riders, which is the hardest thing to do apart from attracting sponsors.”
When asked if there will be more than one event in upcoming years, Richards remained adamant that his futurity is going to continue being a one-day only event.
“I have a lot of fun putting this on, but there will continue to just be one event,” he said. “There’s not enough interest up here to get a circuit going.”
