ProRodeo Sports News - August 6, 2021

Corkill (Feb. 27 in San Antonio) and Dustin Egusquiza and Travis Graves ( July 5 in Oakley City, Utah) – clocked world record-tying runs of 3.3 seconds, initially set by Chad Masters and Corkill at the 2009 National Finals Rodeo. That record is more than a second faster than it was in 1982 when it was set at 4.5 seconds by Rusty Tooley and Dan Fisher in Lovington, N.M. A year after Tooley and Fisher set the record, ProRodeo Hall of Famers Dee Pickett and Mike Beers bested it at 3.8 seconds in Abilene, Texas. Bob Harris and ProRodeo Hall of Famer Tee Woolman improved the record to 3.7 in 1986 with a run in Spanish Fork, Utah. “I mean, it just seems like the team roping industry as a whole is so big,” Brazile said. “Of all the ropes out there, between tie-down roping and team roping, the team roping as far as volume goes, is a bigger industry. So all the technology goes into the team ropes, and they have come a long way in the last 20 years. It’s been amazing. “If you haven’t ever toured a rope factory, like Cactus Ropes in Pleasanton (Texas), it really is such a science to watch those ropes get made,” Brazile said. “They used to just be twisted together, and now the majority of the ropes have a core that gives them a little bit more consistency or a truer feel and are less affected by the elements.” The first game-changing move in team roping ropes came in 1998 fromClassic Rope, when the company patented its rope design. “In 1998, the XR4 was introduced with the patented designed CoreTech Technology; the first nylon four-strand team rope with a core,” reads a description on the company’s website, classicropes.com. “The Powerline Lite, released in 2000, was the first polyester/nylon blended rope with a core. This release was followed by a series of new ropes, each one different from the next, not only by color but by material make and fiber blend. At our core, Classic vows that every new rope introduced will always be uniquely different from all others, fitting a specific need for feel and roping style.” Barry Berg, general manager of Cactus Ropes, has seen and been a part of the evolution of ropes. “In the last 30 years, what changed it first was aged nylon laying in field for six months, and

QUICKER TIMES OVER TIME In 1983, ProRodeo Hall of Famers Dee Pickett and Mike Beers established the team roping record at 3.8 seconds in Abilene, Texas. Bob Harris and ProRodeo Hall of Famer Tee Woolman broke Pickett and Beers’ time with a 3.7-second run in 1986 in Spanish Fork, Utah. The team roping record now is 3.3 seconds, shared by Chad Masters/Jade Corkill (2009, National Finals Rodeo, Las Vegas); Brock Hanson/Ryan Motes (2012, Nacogdoches, Texas); Kaleb Driggers/Junior Nogueira (2017, NFR, Las Vegas); Clay Smith/Jade Corkill (2021, in San Antonio) and Dustin Egusquiza/Travis Graves (2021, in Oakley City, Utah).

CONTINUED ON PAGE 48

Photo courtesy Cactus Ropes Ropes are shown hanging at the Cactus Ropes facility in Pleasanton, Texas. Barry Berg, Cactus Ropes general manager, said Cactus Ropes makes about 200,000 to 240,000 ropes a year.

ProRodeo Sports News 8/6/2021

ProRodeo.com

47