By Ted Harbin, TwisTed Rodeo
Clarendon College alumnus Weston Timberman was a rodeo cowboy long before he ever realized it.
With a dad and an uncle who rode bareback horses, Timberman spent his early childhood with them when times allowed. When the traveling road show that is rodeo passed by his place, cowboys made a pit stop. It was just part of his early development that is paying off now.
“We’d have guys that would be rodeoing and stop by the house throughout the summer and stay on the couch, then hit the road, and I’d always watch my dad and uncle always go out and rodeo,” said Timberman of Columbus, Missouri. “That was the first thing I remember, and then I always wanted to go with them and bring my stuff.
“I knew I was going to be a bareback rider; it’s all I ever wanted to be. Nothing else ever really seemed to cure the itch. That’s what my dad and uncle did. I didn’t even watch the other events growing up. I wanted to watch the bareback riding in the first event, and then go have some popcorn and run around with my friends. I was going to rodeos as a kid for the bareback riding and not the rodeo. That’s just the way it’s always been with me.”
His life’s work is coming to fruition. At just 20 years of age, Timberman is a two-time intercollegiate bareback riding champion while attending Clarendon College on a rodeo scholarship and has had a superb inaugural campaign in ProRodeo. He finished the regular season with $154,100 and will compete at his first National Finals Rodeo as the No. 7 bareback rider in the world standings.
He’s also already clinched the Resistol Rookie of the Year award and carries a boatload of momentum into his first grand championship.
“My whole outlook on rodeo this year was trying to go into the finals and didn’t really figure there’d be another rookie there, so the rookie title would take care of itself,” he said. “Winning that rookie title is something you can only accomplish once. I’m super thankful to be in the position where I’m at.”
With one bucket-list item checked off, he’s not slowing down. His driven nature has him focused on the ultimate prize in rodeo.
“Now that I’ve won the rookie title, let’s go win the world,” said Timberman, who credits part of his success to his sponsors, Cinch, Double J Quarter Horses, Montana Silversmiths and Serratelli Hat Co. “I’m not taking anything away from the Rookie of the Year title; it’s just something that was maybe a touch lower on the totem pole in aspects of goals.”
In order to claim that Montana Silversmiths gold buckle awarded to the world champion, he will need to finish the year atop the money list. He trails the world standings leader, Texan Rocker Steiner, by nearly $80,000, but the $12.5 million purse available during the Dec. 5-14 championship is so great that Timberman can move to the lead in three days.
Go-round winners will pocket nearly $34,000 for each of the 10 nights inside the Thomas & Mack Center on the University of Nevada-Las Vegas campus, the NFR’s home since 1985. For any of the top 15 men on the money list, the world championship is within their grasps.
“This is the best I’ve felt all year,” said Timberman, whose father, Chris, competed for several years and won the bareback riding title at the National Circuit Finals Rodeo in 2006. “With the stock we bring to the finals, it doesn’t matter what you draw; you just have to go out there, do your job every night and just take care of business.
“You have a shot at a check every night no matter what you draw. I’m feeling so good right now. They better be on the lookout, because I’m coming.”
That mental approach is why he’s owned bareback riding at the college level each of the past two years. He has confidence, but it also comes from his raising and having superstar genetics. His grandfather passed the bareback-riding bug to his boys, including Uncle Kelly, a seven-time qualifier who won rodeo’s gold in 2004 and is a two-time NFR aggregate champion at ProRodeo’s grand finale.
His ancestry has paid off both physically and mentally. The son of Chris and Lucinda Young Timberman, he was raised with two brothers, Aden and Kiley. He called it a wild childhood, with the typical rowdy behavior three young boys commonly show.
“Our mom always tried settling us down, but we were boys and didn’t ever want to do that,” he said with a laugh. “Of course, then you have people like Uncle Kelly egging you on. It was an interesting childhood, and we stayed super active and did a bunch of cool things, or stuff I thought was cool, I guess.”
His mom is a veterinarian in Columbus. His dad owns Timberman Construction. He wrestled, played football and practiced gymnastics, and the skills gained through a childhood of being active still play dividends as a professional athlete.
To ride bareback horses, it takes explosive power and strong balance as well as a will to tangle with beasts that can weigh more than half a ton. Points are based on a 100-point scale, with half the score coming from the animal and the rest based on how well the cowboy spurs in rhythm with the horse’s bucking motion.
He spent the year traveling the rodeo trail with another Montana cowboy, Sam Peterson, who also attended Clarendon College. The two have a bond that helps boost one another when necessary and break down the specifics of being bronc busters. It was beneficial to both; Peterson earned just shy of $100,000 during the regular season and finished 20th in the world standings, just five spots shy of earning his own trip to Las Vegas.
Now, he will play for the biggest pay in the game in the City of Lights.
“I’m eager, excited and nervous and ready to make that goal an accomplishment.”
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