Cody Lansing, Cooper McClain and David Jones have returned from the National Junior Finals Rodeo, held June 19-25 in Lebanon, Tennessee.
Representing the Arizona High School Rodeo Association’s junior high division, Lansing made his second national finals appearance, qualifying in team roping and ribbon roping.
He and teammate Brandon Ben scored a time of 9.01 on their first team-roping run, and even after failing to score on their second run, the duo finished in 24th out of 68 teams.
Carly Jo Sells was Lansing’s teammate for the ribbon roping competition, and after scoring a 27.41 in their first run, they responded with a blazing 8.0 in their second run to finish in 43rd place of 113 teams in average time.
McClain, of Cortez, and Jones, of Dolores, both made their nation finals debut as representatives for the Colorado State High School Rodeo Association’s junior high division.
McClain had his first run bull riding on Monday, with his father Jason explaining, “His first bull kind of whipped him down and hit him in the head and he hung on to him and drug around the arena for a while.”
McClain still had a chance to advance if he scored well enough on his second run on Friday. Unfortunately, he got tossed off the bull right at the whistle and was eliminated.
McClain later said that he had just started bull riding in April, and his father added that even after the national finals he had only been on 14 bulls total.
Jones is also fairly new to his event, tie-down roping. He said that after attending a roping clinic this summer, he really started to focus on the craft.
He too found early success by making it to the national finals, attempting runs on Tuesday and Thursday but coming up short of advancing.
“Tuesday I felt pretty confident but I kind of forced my rope onto my calf so I missed,” he explained.“On Thursday, I thought the calf was further out than he was so I threw right passed it.”
McClain and Jones hope to return to the junior national finals next year, while Lansing will make the jump up to the high school level.
