Shelby Boisjoli is having a banner year.
The Canadian cowgirl secured the Women’s Rodeo World Championship All-Around Title with team roping and breakaway roping points, taking top honors at the event held Oct. 27–29, 2021, in Las Vegas’s South Point Arena.
Bosjoli, who won second in the breakaway roping worth $20,000 itself with a 2.02 second run and fourth in the team roping with a 11.56-second run, finished out the week with a 120.75-point lead on Whitney DeSalvo (her team roping partner) with a total of 1,493.5 points to earn herself the WRWC All-Around title and a $20,000 bonus. Boisjoli walks away from the ground-breaking event with a whopping $56,966.67.
“I wish we weren’t in Vegas with all of this money right now,” Boisjoli laughed.
It came down to the final round in the WRWC event, where Boisjoli backed into the box in the breakaway roping and turned in a 2.02-second run as the first roper out to set the pace. She finished No. 2 in the world, worth $20,000, behind the WRWC Breakaway Roping Champion Madison Outhier’s 1.91-second run.
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“The final round in the breakaway was stressful, but I was the first girl out,” Boisjoli said. “I was just going to set the pace and make them beat me. They made some great runs. Madi definitely deserves that. Anytime there’s over $40,000 up, it’s Madi’s setup. She’s so clutch.”
To Boisjoli’s surprise her heeling performance was stronger than her breakaway roping.
“My breakaway roping wasn’t great,” said the 2021 Pro Rodeo regular season breakaway roping world standings leader, Boisjoli. “I was pretty scared of the barrier in the first few rounds and was just trying to be safe to get to the final round. I finally put some good runs together when it counted.”
Boisjoli added $10,000 to her earnings after placing fourth in the team roping with a 11.56-second run, heeling for DeSalvo.
“We were just going to go at the steers and have fun,” Boisjoli said. “The steer went left a little bit. I heeled the steer and had two feet. Whitney just got to the wall and couldn’t really pull him anymore. I fumbled my dally a little bit and slipped a leg. I was just having fun heeling the whole time. I guess that’s probably why it worked out because I wasn’t stressed about it. We were just having fun and then all of the sudden we were like, ‘Holy smokes, we have a chance right here.’”
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What helped Boisjoli be successful in both the breakaway roping and the heeling was the horsepower she had under her. She rode her 2021 Nutrena Pro Rodeo Breakaway Horse of the Year Onna in the breakaway and casually heeled down on DeSalvo’s all-star roan mare Becky, aboard whom DeSalvo has won every major All-Girl heeling title to this point with hundreds of thousands in earnings on her alone.
“[Onna] is a sweetheart and always gives me a good chance,” Boisjoli said. “Even if I mess up, I still have a chance to win on her. She tries so hard for me. She knows when we don’t do good. Becky made it easy. She’s a great horse. She’s won a lot of money. I jumped on. She told me that Becky was going to want to get to the inside a little bit and I said, ‘Perfect.’ We went at them.”
Coming off of this All-Around title high, Boisjoli now plans to head back to Texas and prepare for her shot at bringing home a Pro Rodeo breakaway roping world title.
