On Friday afternoon, as Jamie Steiner watched her daughter, Steely, sprint down the home stretch at the Tucson Rodeo Grounds atop the mare on which she helped her train, she couldn’t help but listen to the roar.
Jamie was once used to hearing those roars herself. She was a National Finals Rodeo barrel racer who gave it up before the road chewed her up, married to a former world champion steer wrestler, Sid, who also hung up the boots early.
They once traveled the country searching for glory in an arena. Now they watch their progeny fight for the same roars.
But they don’t sound much like they do at the La Fiesta De Los Vaqueros, she said, and Friday took her back. Just like it did on Saturday, watching her son, Rocker, a rookie bareback rider off to a sizzling start on the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association circuit.
Steely Steiner took Hillbilly Bombshell, as fast as she’d go, stretching her powerful legs for all they’re worth.
These days, with the rising cost of fuel and feed, they’re worth more and more.
And so are the roars.
A family affair
This was a good week for the Steiner siblings, and not just because the whole family got to come to town. Tucson has become a family affair for the Steiners, bringing two generations of world champions and another generation that appears ready for the world stage.
Last weekend in Los Fresnos, Texas, Rocker spun Whiskey Trip for eight seconds and an 87, good for an $1,805 purse. Just six weeks ago, he made his professional debut in Odessa at the Sandhills Stock Show & Rodeo, winning the event with an 86.5 atop Ghost Town for a cool $2,177. Then came Denver, and an 84 atop Jason’s Pride, an 88 on Dream Machine in the semifinals and an 87.5 atop Ain’t No Angel in the final round with a share of the title, a three-ride run totaling nearly $10,000.
Steely similarly burst out of the chutes in 2020, even if the COVID-19 pandemic delayed her actual rookie season until last year.
In 2020, Steely cashed in her first three events, then five more times in the truncated season. Last year, she hit four-figure checks six times, including top-5 finishes in Odessa; Reno; Ogden, Utah; Preston, Idaho; and Salinas, Calif.
This year, she’s already cashed four times, including $4,279 for winning the Tucson long-go.
“It’s definitely been a learning experience,” Steely said of the start of her career. “It’s not easy. You get out and your horses don’t feel good. Or the horse feels good and you don’t. You just have to know one day it’s gonna all come together.”
It did on Friday in her 17.38-second run. Even if the beginnings started well before then.
“You win rodeos outside of the arena,” Steely said, sounding wise beyond her 20 years. “You put in all the work for years and years and you know your horse and you take care of your horse because you have another athlete involved.”
For that lesson, Steely had a good teacher.
Learning how to win
Well, she’s had several good teachers.
There’s mom, who taught her a thing or two about barrel racing. She advanced to the NFR in 2000, had Steely not too long after and left the full-time circuit. There’s dad, Sid, who won the 2002 NFR gold buckle with a 3.3 second barrel-chested tackle of a massive steer. There’s granddad, Bobby, the 1973 bullriding world champion.
And there’s Bebe.
Steely was 11 when her parents brought back the beautiful mare to Texas from Oklahoma. She was great in front of a crowd, Jamie said, but when they took her home, “you couldn’t ride her.”
“I’m not much for giving up, especially with an animal, so we went to learning, and that horse taught Steely so much about how your emotions and your demeanor affect them,” Jamie said. “If you’re tight and tense, they’re tight and tense. She was so unforgiving, but at the same time, so forgiving. if you did it right, she showed you.”
It was on that horse that Steely learned to race, even if the results weren’t immediate. Steely said she struggled in high school, never advancing to the Texas state finals, much less nationals.
But she learned so much from those struggles, an education she’s putting into practice these days. And so much that she’ll put into play on Sunday in front of a sold-out Tucson Rodeo crowd.
“I think because of the struggles I had then, I had to learn how to get out of the struggle,” she said. “I had to learn how to win. It wasn’t put out there for me to win. Learning how to understand my horse, I learned that early on. I had good horses but they weren’t easy. They weren’t going to run the pattern for me. It made me be able to read a horse and what they like.”
