Giddy Up: The Gay Rodeo Circuit Hits the Big Time

It's summer and the smells of the rodeo lay heavy over the outdoor arena. It's gay rodeo time again and the living is easy.

I love the gay rodeo. It has something for just about everyone. The events, the cowboys, the excitment of competition, the cowboys. Oh well, you can't say I have a one track mind.

Details Magazine has made the gay rodeo cool to guys who read the publication. In the August 2005 issue, Sonny Koerner, Mr. Atlantic States Gay Rodeo Association 200 proundly sits on his horse bare butt and loving it. This guy is what makes the International Gay Rodeo Association what it is today, the third largest rodeo association in the world with 20 scheduled events annually. One of the biggest is Cowtown Rodeo in Dallas Fort Worth. While I haven't been to the Cowtown Rodeo, I've been to several others, and I always left the weekend with a smile on my face.

The gay rodeo community, like other communities, can be clickish, but it gets down to business to host these annual events. The turnouts are large and while PETA loves to picket, these rodeos are very animal friendly. It's more about raw skill and determination in events such as the barrel run, pole bending and flag race, and the crowds really get into the action.

I loved one quote in the article about how to wear your Wranglers or Levi's 517's which almost all rodeo guys subscribe to: "They should be tight enough to show what religion you are." Now that's some kind of form fitting jeans.

Some find the drag events entertaining. I usually tolerate them, because they give the cowboys a rest from the main competitions. The drag queens compete annually for the title of Miss IGRA. These events combine camp and athletic prowlness and show gay strength in a Stonewall kind of way. These guys take the competition seriously and the winnings go to worthy gay causes.

Sonny Koerner, one of the champions on the circuit, was a kid growing up loving horses and the rodeo. He was skeptical at first, but later realized, while attending a gay rodeo one weekend, that this is the real thing and embraced it.

One of the fun and frustrating events is the goat dressing competition. Putting on a pair on underpants or udderpants, (oh brother, I couldn't resist) on a goat is harder than it looks. Cowboys like to mix up their competions and compete in both the stock events such as steer riding, bull riding and chute dogging and the goat dressing competitions.

Sonny has won many a buckle. While not on the circuit, Sonny is employed as a counterterriorism expert in Washington, DC.

The article concludes with a funny confrontation between Sonny and one of the patrons of a local DFW gay C&W bar. The dude tries to grab Sonny's ass. Sonny responds, "Do you realize that you can't (grab my ass) this time?" The troll responds, "What do I have to do to get a belt buckle?" Sonny replies, " I typically don't give my buckles away. I earn them and they mean something to me". The troll pouts and stamps out of the bar area. Sonny concludes, "Now of course, the real story is that those goat dressing buckles and stuff, I might have given a few of them away." Yea, Sonny, I know a few hot guys that would love strutting one of your buckles.

So if you got a little spare time the rest of the summer, check out the gay rodeo circuit. For more info, click on, http://www.igra.com