ProRodeo Sports News - Sept. 3, 2021

TIME CAPSULE BOBBY JOE SKOAL Horse Heaven 30 years later,

Bobby Joe Skoal’s NFR performance still one to recall BY TRACY RENCK S ometimes piecing together facts from 30 years ago can be a difficult process. That wasn’t the case for stock contractor Kirsten Vold when talking about Harry Vold Rodeo Company’s saddle bronc horse Bobby Joe Skoal. Bobby Joe Skoal was named the National

Finals Rodeo top saddle bronc horse in 1991. He dumped Bud Longbrake in Round 3 before Billy Etbauer had an 86-point ride on him to win Round 10. “He’s the only one I raised from birth that has won awards,” Harry Vold said in the 1991 year-end edition of ProRodeo Sports News . Harry Vold was Kirsten’s father and a member of the ProRodeo Hall of Fame. He passed away in March 2017 at the age of 93. Kirsten remembers that 1991 NFR and the pride her father had of Bobby Joe Skoal. “Dad raised him, and he was the saddle bronc horse of the year for three years in a row, and he was the only one to do that out of anything dad had raised,” Kirsten said. “Dad had other multi-year horses of the year, but he never did have a horse he raised win horse of the year three years in a row like Bobby Joe Skoal. That’s the reason he’s always been so special to us because he raised him. He didn’t purchase him from anybody else. “He was a very special animal to this family. He bucked a long time and we retired him in Colorado Springs in the early 2000s. He lived into his late 20s.” The 1991 NFR was no fluke for Bobby Joe Skoal. The horse was named the PRCA Saddle Bronc Horse of the Year in 1991-93. “Bobby Joe Skoal was very honest and true,” Kirsten said. “Whenever they talked to bronc riders about him, they also talked about how he just bucked hard and was really strong. He didn’t have any ducks or dives or have any tricks to him. “He just bucked really hard and was an honest bronc. I had a steer wrestler tell me one time that it was hardly fair for anybody to draw that

PRCA ProRodeo photo Billy Etbauer had an 86-point ride on Harry Vold Rodeo Company’s Bobby Joe Skoal to win Round 10 of the 1991 National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas. Bobby Joe Skoal was chosen as the top saddle bronc horse of that year’s NFR.

horse because he just stands out in the crowd. He was a star and looked showy. Unless you got bucked off, you were going win the rodeo on him.” Despite Bobby Joe Skoal’s status, he blended in with the rest of the rodeo company’s horses. “He knew he was a star, but he hauled with all the other horses, and he didn’t get any special treatment,” Kirsten said. “He didn’t have his own special stall or a special pen or anything like that. He ran with all the bucking horses just like they all do. He just did his own thing. He wasn’t gentle, like where you could feed him treats, but he wasn’t wild. He was just a good ol’ bronc. “One year Ty Murray had him, back in the time when Colorado Springs, (Colo.), Dodge City (Kan.), and Cheyenne were consecutive (rodeos), he drew him three weeks in a row because he was in the short round at those rodeos.” Kirsten said Bobby Joe Skoal has been cloned. “Dr. Gregg Veneklasen at Timber Creek Veterinarian Hospital (in Canyon, Texas) took a patch of skin off him,” Kirsten said. “They cloned him about five years ago and he’s a stud there at the clinic, and I would say at least 25 to 30 different stock contractors throughout the PRCA have bred to that clone of Bobby Joe Skoal.”

ProRodeo Sports News 9/3/2021

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