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Issue date: 2/23/07 Section: News

Media Credit: Deja Elder, Photo Editor Junior Aaron Gillespie and freshman Lauren Kaker prepare 2-year-old Pud for a Feb 21 sheep show while Alan Sandbothe looks on. Pud placed third in his age class. Gillespie and Kaker are members of ASU's show team.

Media Credit: Deja Elder, Photo Editor The pig naps during the hectic stock show week...

Media Credit: Deja Elder, Photo Editor ...and some are just a sucker for a person with a camera.

For many of the rodeo competitors of the San Angelo Stock Show and Rodeo, the rodeo life is one of long road trips, living in a cramped travel trailer and constantly competing to make a living.

Most rodeo fans only see what goes on inside the arena during the events and performances, but if one takes a walk to the east side parking lot of the San Angelo Coliseum right now, they'll find a community all its own.

Hundreds of travel trailers, RVs and animal trailers fill out the area where competitors from all over the U.S. and their animals make their home during the 10-day event.

"We have a 30-foot gooseneck trailer with a living quarters in it, and we usually stay in there," Jon Peek, a professional calf roper from Pueblo, Colo., said. "(If) you have too many people carpooling with you to get to the next rodeo, somebody might get a hotel room and split a room."

Peek admitted, however, that hotels are rare, and most of the time his home is his trailer.

Even some of the female performers, like Marisa Simpson, a barrel racer from Arizona, make their homes in this makeshift, un-luxurious way.

She said she travels across the country to events with only her two dogs in tow.

"It's a lot of work," Simpson said. "It makes for a long drive by yourself, but it's worth it. This is what I do for a hobby and a job, really."

The yearly San Angelo Rodeo is a break from the life on the road for San Angelo's Cole Hardin, a bronc rider, but he said that the close relationships and proximity of the participants of the events make it all worthwhile.

"Well, the camaraderie is great," Hardin said. "With these guys doing this, you'll have family from here to Washington. If you have a problem in that state, you call them and they'll be there."

A lot of rodeo fans may think that the rodeo life is filled with partying and unadulterated fun, but Peek said for most of the performers it's a job they take very seriously.

"Rodeo is a business," Peek said. "That's what I'm trying to make it. We usually keep all that stuff separate from any of our competition."

Hardin said that downtime is very rare in the life of the rodeo performers.

"Only every now and then you'll have just a couple of days to kill somewhere," Hardin said. "A lot of these guys will rope if they've got friends that rope (and) have arenas here, or they'll go work out.

"As far as killing time, the traveling is the hardest part."

So what does one of the female rodeo stars do in her downtime in a place that is filled mostly with rough-and-tumble cowboys?

"(I) watch movies, read my Bible, and just hang out in my trailer or take care of my horses," said Simpson, who is 24 and married.

Peek said that when there is some downtime, he likes to keep it low-key.

"We're either playing cards with our friends or working out going to the gym, playing ball or just taking care of the business with our horses and our rigs, keeping them ready to go for when we are competing," Peek said.

Peek said he was on his way out of town earlier than most others for yet another road trip to get to another event after Feb. 18's performance. Almost all of the other competitors will be back on that familiar road right after the San Angelo shows are done to find where they will next make their temporary home.

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