Lake County athletes get ready for ultimate rodeo stage this

weekend

GALLUP, N.M. - Will Powell, Robert Rider and Callie Outoupalik have quite the road trip ahead of them. The three middle school rodeo athletes qualified for the Junior High Rodeo Nationals this weekend and will be taking their talents south against the best of the best.

"I've heard that it's really nice drive going down to Gallup," Rider said.

Rider and Outoupalik can turn to Powell for road trip tips as Powell also qualified for nationals last year.

"I think it's got to be a little bit better this year because I've already gone through the ropes," Powell said of nationals. "Going down there it was a long trip, but we made it pretty fun and we did a lot of hanging out. It was a good trip."

Powell will be competing in chute dogging, tie down roping and ribbing roping. He won state championships in all three events.

"I want to place again at nationals and if I can come away with a win, that would be awesome," he said.

Outoupalik, who will be competing in girls' breakaway and team roping, has a state title under her belt after taking first in team roping.

"I was really nervous about state," Outoupalik said. "If you have one bad weekend you don't go to nationals. I've seen people miss at roping after you hadn't seen them miss all year."

Outoupalik had a secret weapon though, an iPod that was able to calm her nerves as she focused in on her events.

It certainly helped out, and Apple should probably do a commercial as Outoupalik and her roping partner made history.

"We're the only two-girl team to win the junior high state event," she said. "I'm very, very, very happy. I'm pretty blessed and it's hard to believe. I don't think it sunk in until about 12 hours after I heard it. I thought ‘Oh wow, I'm going to nationals."

Outoupalik also qualified in breakaway, after smartly having a second loop to use after her first loop didn't hit its mark.

"If I didn't carry that second loop I wouldn't have gone to nationals," she said.

Rider, along with the other two athletes, will be taking special care feeding and working out his horse, the most important teammate in the sport of rodeo, and getting in some last minute practicing.

"I just need to work on my roping a little bit more and I might have a chance at nationals," Rider said.

With the way all three competed at the state finals, that chance is probably a good one.