KANSAS BAREBACK RIDER RIDES FOR HIS GOALS

Posted Thursday, September 10, 2009

Ft. Scott, Kans. (September 10, 2009) – Pro rodeo cowboy Jared Keylon has two driving forces behind his rodeo competition.

The bareback rider from Ft. Scott, Kansas, loves getting on bucking horses, don’t get him wrong. But he has two main goals this year: 1) qualify for the National Finals Rodeo, pro rodeo’s world championship, and 2), pay for a new house.

Keylon, who sits in the number one spot in the Prairie Circuit standings, has been married for nearly a year and he and his wife have already accomplished one of their goals. They’ve bought some land near Uniontown, just 15 miles west of Ft. Scott. Now, it’s time to put a house on the ground.

With the money he’s won at rodeos in Kansas, Oklahoma and Nebraska, Keylon is working on paying for that house. He finished in first place in Abilene and Mound City, Kansas, and Hugo, Poteau and Ponca City, Oklahoma. He’s placed in the top eight in Dodge City, Bennington, Garden City, and Manhattan, Kansas, and in Burwell and North Platte, Nebraska. So far, Keylon has won $12,800 just in the Prairie Circuit.

With Prairie Circuit rodeos drawing to a close, his attention has shifted from rodeos close to home to the big shows, in hopes that he can finish the rodeo year, which ends September 30, as one of the top fifteen bareback riders in the world. The top 15 cowboys in each event qualify for the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas. So far, Keylon is seventeenth in the world standings.

In the next month, Keylon will compete at rodeos in Ft. Madison, Iowa, Lewiston and Pendleton, Idaho, Puyallup, Wash., El Paso, Amarillo, Abilene, and Texarkana, Texas, and Albuquerque, New Mex. And he’ll wrap up the month of October with competition at the Prairie Circuit Finals Rodeo in Kansas City October 22-24.

He hadn’t been home for a month until this week, and was only home 15 hours before he had to leave again to go to another rodeo. “I came home yesterday and saw my wife and I was telling her, ‘golly, it feels like a month since I’ve been here,’ and she said, ‘it has been a month.’”

But the goals keep Keylon going. “I really want to make the Finals (NFR), and I really want to get my new place set up. So that keeps me out there and gives me a lot of drive,” Keylon said. And marriage helps, too. “Everything I do, I don’t try to do just for myself, I try to do for me and my wife. I don’t try to just think of myself,” Keylon said.

His wife, Ashley, keeps the home fires burning and he’s grateful for that. “She does a great job and never complains. She takes care of me.” Ashley, a college instructor in Ft. Scott, acts as his travel agent, too, booking flights to and from rodeos. “I’m very proud of her, more proud of her than anything else I have in the world,” Keylon said.

And Keylon pays her back. “I do the dishes every once in a while when I come home,” he said. “That’s the good thing about us. We swap off on everything. I even clean house.” But for the next month, the house cleaning will have to wait, as Keylon works on his list: trying to make his first ever NFR, and paying for that new house.

###

Upcoming pro rodeos in the Prairie Circuit include: the River City Roundup Sept. 24-26 (Omaha, Neb.), the Tulsa State Fair Oct. 8-10 (Tulsa, Okla.), and the Prairie Circuit Finals Rodeo Oct. 22-24 (Kemper Arena, Kansas City).

About the Prairie Circuit Finals Rodeo in Kansas City:

The American Royal will host the Prairie Circuit Finals Rodeo October 22-24, 2009 at Kemper Arena in Kansas City. There, Prairie Circuit cowboys and cowgirls will compete to earn a berth at the Dodge National Circuit Finals Rodeo (DNCFR), held annually every April in Pocatello, Idaho. Two competitors from each event, the year end champion and the aggregate champion, will go on to represent the Prairie Circuit at the DNCFR.