Round Three: Guts and Glory

If you're anything like me, you are now so immersed in the drama of the World Finals that you kind of wish it would never end and you are also running out of words to describe it. So here are just a few things that leap to mind about last night:

• It was almost a relief to return to a "normal" bull pen after Round Two.  Those bulls on Thursday night were such supernovas that last night's very respectable pen seemed almost tame in comparison.  Unless you were trying to ride them, in which case I'm sure they seemed wild enough.

•  The Renato Nunes come back is incredible. Who would have guessed this would happen? He could barely lift his head the past six weeks and now this. What happened to turn it around? 

• But the joy of seeing Renato's return is tempered by disappointment for Austin Meier and J.B. Mauney. After coming in a very close second last year and covering eight out of eight bulls at last year's Finals, this was supposed to be J.B.'s year.  Instead, he has been physically hammered at the Finals, doesn't have a single ride, and can barely lift his free arm.  Meier has done everything right all season and still has only one ride this week. It is the nature of competitive sport, of course. But it's rough. 

• An interesting fact:  If you compare the top fifteen riders in the World Finals with the top fifteen riders in the world standings, only four of the names are the same.  Those names are all Brazilian:  Renato Nunes, Valdiron de Oliveira, Guilherme Marchi, and Silvano Alves.  

•  Memorable ride of the night:  Chris Shivers on Another Husker.  Not the highest marked ride of the night and not the best, but for sheer drive and guts, from a guy with a concussion, a sprained shoulder, and bruises from shoulder to knee, it doesn't get much more "champion" than that.  

• Watching Wesley Lourenco ride you feel like you are watching the future of bull riding.  He is twenty years old.

•  Moment I bet the PBR wishes it could take back:  Craig Hummer asking for a replay of Ben Jones banging his (helmeted) head against the railings after bucking off Little JR, only to discover that it was accompanied by the sound of Ben shouting the f-word every time his head hit the fence.  You have to love the guy, and worry about his head. 

The Classic bulls come out to play again tonight, and I'll be back here tomorrow. 

For a complete list of all World Finals Edition articles, click here.  

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Imaginary Cowgirl: Alive at Uncasville

Live events leave my head spinning.  The roar of the crowd, the music, the announcers, the fireworks, the giant flame throwers blazing heat right by my head, the smell of bulls and dirt, smoke and diesel fuel - these things fill the body and, in my case, chase out pretty much all thought.  I'm a thinking person.  I like to analyze and ponder and I learn by writing and talking and thinking.  But at a bull riding there's no time to think, no time to analyze, and if I did talk, no one would be able to hear me.  A bull runs toward the fence I am standing behind.  There's nothing like a speeding bull to turn a thinker into an action figure.

On television, for me, much of the game is mental.  I study how things happen.  When did the rope come out of the hand?  What does it mean, a cornering bull?  Was it a slap or not?  What were the scores?  In real time, I don't much care about those things.  I am abandoned in the moment.  It takes a confetti explosion to even make me notice a score at all. Suddenly I understand what Mike Lee means when he says "bull riding is not about the brain."  It's not about the brain.  I understand what he means when he says that "bull riding is not about thinking, it's about freedom."  I get it.  I get it as much as I ever will without being on the back of a bull.  Of course I will return to the brain and its thoughts.  But this is better.

It makes me dizzy.  It upsets the applecart of my carefully organized mind.  This is a good thing.  I could use more of this.  Don't get me wrong:  I love the analysis, the numbers, the statistics, the watching, the writing, the thinking.  But when I am here, in the moment, breathing the dust, feet on the dirt, draped on the fence and then stepping away - bull riding doesn't make me think, it makes my blood sing.  Here, I am not a writer or a thinker or a reporter.  I am a fan on the ground, alive in the snap-crackle-pop.

Why They Ride

Even with the rigors and dangers of the job, riders keep saying, "I just love riding bulls." As near as I can figure out, there are several reasons why that would be true.

1. Adrenaline: You want to win, you are excited, you are afraid, you ride, you don't ride, you might get hurt, you do get hurt, and you end up on the dirt running from a large animal that wants to run you over. All compressed into a pinprick of time. It's like a black hole into which everything gets pulled, and then you are thrown back out of the vortex, a mortal man again. I'm not sure there's a drug in the world that has that same effect.

2. Warrior spirit: Adriano Moraes said that bull riding is "a crowd, an arena, a beast, and a man." These guys are gladiators. They want to win, they have trained to win, and they are in top physical shape. They are competitors against a worthy adversary, and the odds are against them.

3. Money: You can make a lot of money at the elite level of bull riding. You can also make nothing. But even if you're in last place and make nothing, there's still the hope and possibility that next weekend you can make more than I do in a year.

4. Lifestyle: Most of these guys grew up around this life, and the tour is a lifestyle unto itself: on the road, with the guys, wearing cowboy boots, working out, helping each other, doing what they love to do.

5. Magic: I have to think that when they find that center and successfully ride a bull, something kind of magical happens. Everything works: the crowd, the arena, the beast, and the man. For that, I'd ride bulls too.