{"id":402296,"date":"2026-01-29T09:17:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T15:17:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/?p=402296"},"modified":"2026-02-03T09:39:57","modified_gmt":"2026-02-03T15:39:57","slug":"cronkite-news-native-bull-riding-team-shines-at-rodeo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/2026\/01\/29\/cronkite-news-native-bull-riding-team-shines-at-rodeo\/","title":{"rendered":"Cronkite News: Native bull riding team shines at rodeo"},"content":{"rendered":" \"Professional<\/a>
A bull rider is thrown forward as the bull bucks during a Professional Bull Riders event at Desert Diamond Arena on October 12, 2025, in Glendale, Arizona. Photo courtesy of PBR<\/figcaption>\r\n
8 seconds in the desert: Professional bull riders carry deep Arizona roots into arena<\/div>\r\n
Thursday, January 29, 2026<\/div>\r\n
By Izabella Reseigh, Cronkite News <\/div>\r\n

<\/p>\r\nFor more stories from Cronkite News, visit cronkitenews.azpbs.org<\/A>.<\/STRONG>\r\n

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GLENDALE — The dirt moves before the crowd stirs. A low tremor rolls beneath the chutes as a 1,500-pound bull slams its shoulder into steel, dust lifting in thin sheets under the desert lights.<\/p>\r\n

Cowboys lean quietly along the arena rails. Leather creaks. Rosin snaps. One rider bows his head in prayer. Another tests the flex in his glove. Eight seconds at a time, a sport once rooted in ranch work now unfolds beneath LED scoreboards, national TV cameras and sold-out crowds \u2013 and Arizona has become one of its brightest stages.<\/p>\r\n

\u201cArizona has a deep history in Western sports,\u201d said Casey Lane, general manager of the Arizona Ridge Riders, one of 10 city-based teams in the Professional Bull Riders\u2019 rapidly growing league. \u201cIt\u2019s a place where all the cultures that contribute to bull riding come together.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

The 2025 Ridge Riders roster reflected that mix: riders from Brazil, Canada, Utah and Colorado, alongside one Arizona native \u2014 JaCauy Hale, a 22-year-old from Ganado whose Indian National Finals Rodeo title launched him into PBR. Team captain Eduardo Aparecido, a veteran from Gouvel\u00e2ndia, Brazil, anchors a lineup that includes Keyshawn Whitehorse, a Navajo rider who earned PBR Rookie of the Year in 2018.<\/p>\r\n

For many Indigenous athletes, the arena feels familiar.<\/p>\r\n

\u201cOur lifestyle involves animals,\u201d Whitehorse said. \u201cAnywhere on the reservation, you\u2019re going to find horses or livestock. I try to keep that same foundation at the professional level \u2014 not forget who I am.\u201d<\/p>\r\n \"Keyshawn<\/a>

Keyshawn Whitehorse of the Arizona Ridge Riders celebrates after a ride during a Professional Bull Riders event at Desert Diamond Arena on October 12, 2025, in Glendale, Arizona. Photo courtesy of Professional Bull Riders Inc.<\/figcaption>\r\n

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\u2018We\u2019ve always been around horses <\/div>\r\n

Lane relies on Mo Brings Plenty, the team\u2019s director of culture, to help blend backgrounds and personalities into a functioning team \u2014 something new in a sport built on individual performance.<\/p>\r\n

\u201cBull riding\u2019s always been an individual sport,\u201d Lane said. \u201cMo\u2019s role is about creating an environment where the guys feel supported, listened to and connected.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

Brings Plenty, a Lakota horseman known for his acting role on the TV series \u201cYellowstone,\u201d said the Southwest feels like home turf. Arizona\u2019s concentration of tribal communities and ranching traditions creates a natural gathering point.<\/p>\r\n

\u201cThey love the Western lifestyle,\u201d he said. \u201cThey\u2019re country folks. That\u2019s what makes it so much different than anywhere else in the country.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

For Brings Plenty, everything begins with the horse.<\/p>\r\n

\u201cAs American Indian people, we\u2019ve always had a great connection with horses \u2014 not just physically but spiritually,\u201d he said. \u201cA lot of our people don\u2019t see them as a tool. They\u2019re a part of us.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

His horse Zorro may appear on \u201cYellowstone,\u201d but Brings Plenty said the animal also has the gentleness to carry an infant.<\/p>\r\n

\u201cThat connection and bond \u2014 it\u2019s beautiful,\u201d he said.<\/p>\r\n

A team sport in cowboy country <\/div>\r\n

Bull riding as a stand-alone sport dates to 1993, when 20 riders split from traditional rodeo to form PBR. For nearly 30 years, the sport operated as a touring individual circuit. Teams bull riding \u2014 five-on-five contests between city-based squads \u2014 didn\u2019t exist until four years ago.<\/p>\r\n

\u201cWhen we were selecting where to have a franchise, Arizona really stood out,\u201d Lane said. \u201cYou have Hispanic culture, Native American culture and traditional cowboy culture all in one place.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

Fans have responded. Lane said Ridge Riders Days in Glendale draws roughly 30,000 spectators each year, with preseason events bringing thousands more.<\/p>\r\n

National numbers have grown, too, Andrew Giangola, PBR\u2019s vice president of strategic communications said. PBR\u2019s Game of the Week on CBS has repeatedly out-rated other major sports. A 2025 PBR Teams game on CBS drew 2.707 million average viewers, which was the most-watched PBR telecast ever on the network.<\/p>\r\n

\u201cSome Sundays, outside of the NFL and college football, bull riding is the most watched sport,\u201d Giangola said.<\/p>\r\n

Training for a sport where \u2018it\u2019s not if, it\u2019s when <\/div>\r\n

The spectacle masks the risk. Giangola said roughly one in 15 rides results in an injury \u2014 an extremely high rate compared with mainstream sports.<\/p>\r\n

\u201cThe cowboys know they\u2019re going to get hurt,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s not if, it\u2019s when.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

To prepare, Ridge Riders athletes spend much of the week training under Renan Camilo, a Brazilian athletic trainer who oversees strength work, conditioning and recovery.<\/p>\r\n

\u201cWe usually strength train at least two or three times mid-season,\u201d Whitehorse said. \u201cThen we work the fundamentals \u2014 the barrel, practice bulls, slowing things down.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

Competition-day routine is sacred: pray, lay out gear, prepare the bull rope, tape up, warm up.<\/p>\r\n

\u201cI try to keep the process the same,\u201d Whitehorse said. \u201cThat keeps my mind right.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

Bulls as partners, not villains <\/div>\r\n

Outside the arena, PBR frequently pushes back against myths that bulls are shocked or otherwise abused to make them buck.<\/p>\r\n

\u201cThere\u2019s no sport without the bull,\u201d Giangola said. \u201cYou can\u2019t force a 1,800-pound animal to do anything it doesn\u2019t want to do.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

PBR bulls are bred specifically for bucking, trained with a flank rope tied loosely around the haunches and a 60-pound dummy. Hot shots are banned. Spurs are dulled and inspected.<\/p>\r\n

\u201cOur bulls live four to six times longer than commercial cattle,\u201d Giangola said. \u201cThey\u2019re treated like rock stars.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

Brings Plenty sees that relationship in quiet moments behind the scenes.<\/p>\r\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a video of Eduardo just scratching his bull\u2019s back before a ride,\u201d he said. \u201cWe pray for the riders \u2014 and for the bulls. They are their dancing partners.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

Arizona as a proving ground <\/div>\r\n

Arizona\u2019s team is becoming part of PBR\u2019s future, Lane said, with youth camps and rider-development efforts planned in the state.<\/p>\r\n

\u201cWe want athletes in other sports to see this as an option,\u201d Giangola said. \u201cThere\u2019s a clear path to a professional career riding bulls.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

For fans, the connection is simpler: a sport rooted in the landscape outside the arena walls.<\/p>\r\n

\u201cBull riding \u2014 and the Ridge Riders \u2014 give people a way to express pride in Arizona and the Western lifestyle,\u201d Giangola said.<\/p>\r\n

When the gate swings open, Whitehorse says the noise falls away.<\/p>\r\n

\u201cWhen that gate opens, everything slows down,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s what we live for \u2014 that one moment.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

In Arizona, those eight seconds carry generations of horsemanship, the prayers of elders and the futures of young athletes hoping to climb into the chute one day \u2014 all in a desert arena where bull riding is reinventing itself for the next generation.<\/p>\r\n

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This article<\/a> first appeared on Cronkite News<\/a> and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License<\/a>.<\/p>

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