Reigning World Champions Tyler Wade and Wesley Thorp are taking advantage of the dog days of summer, starting off August 2024 with a week that paid them $16,077 a man at the ProRodeos.
They won the first round at the Dodge City (Kansas) Roundup with a 4.9 for $3,547 each, were 3.8 to win the Mountain Valley Stampede in Heber City, Utah for $5,418 a man, won fourth at Dalhart, Texas’s XIT Rodeo for $1,691 each and smoked a 3.7 to win the Castle Rock, Colorado Douglas County Fair and Rodeo for $5,421 each.
And they did it on a first-class string of horses—including Wade’s great Espuela Bro, his family-trained mare RS Rare Timber, and Thorp’s borrowed duo of two-time and reigning Horse of the Year Kadabra King, owned by Patrick Smith, and 7-year-old CD Diamond son SJR Play The Diamond, owned by Arizona’s Kenny Reeves. Wade is flush with horsepower—having another mare, the Apache Blue Boy daughter Apache R Biscuit at home if he needs her, while Thorp is afoot and getting by with a little help from his friends.
“We got the momentum going our way a couple weeks ago, and we’ve done an OK job of staying the course and not getting too down,” Thorp said. “It just went our way. Tyler’s horses worked good, he turned a lot of steers, and I got to ride an amazing heel horse, and that made a huge difference. Tyler roped good, our horses worked good, we drew well, and it went our way.”
“We stay pretty level headed,” Wade added. “We don’t get too high on the highs and too low on the lows. If I wave it off two, and he heels one and loses him, the last thing we need to do is get discouraged in our roping. It’s little stuff here and there. It’s not a big deal that needs to be worried about and be addressed. I curled a front leg and got a barrier, he heeled a few and lost them. We’re not throwing them in the air and laying it beside them. We want to be real with ourselves, but not get down when we just miss a couple.”
Wade is splitting his time between Espuela Bro, who he calls Spur and is now 17, and RS Rare Timber, a mare he calls Brandy, just 8.
“I got the two best horses I’ve ever had at one time,” Wade said. “I’ve never had two that felt like they were just really good. I don’t think you need to give one horse any particular setup, so I don’t only ride Spur just when it’s fast or only ride Brandy when the barrier is long. It try not to just ride her everywhere like Cheyenne. Cheyenne and the Gripp are brutal on one. If that’s all they get, that’s tough because they’re going to think you’re going to ask them for their life every single time they’re in the box. If you ride one just on the short scores, they’ll get to ducking. We’re trying to play the setups in their favor. She’s still green when it comes to being 3-4 seconds. She fit great at Dodge City, but I didn’t want to overdo it on her, so I only rode her on one.”
Thorp—though having at least five ProRodeo-caliber good ones—is catch-riding Turbo, the 14-year-old dun gelding that’s been voted the PRCA/AQHA Horse of the Year the last two years under Patrick Smith.
“My horses have slowly had one problem after the other,” Thorp said. “I had RayJay (his world champion mount) and a new bay one I bought. RayJay got hurt at Gunnison, and the bay horse got really sore on a couple of hauls. They went down, and I was five horses down as of just over a week ago. Patrick didn’t hesitate a bit to offer his horses. He was super adamant. I told him I was going to try to buy one, but he was super adamant that I could ride his. And Kenny Reeves was great about me riding the yellow. They definitely helped me out in a big way. Patrick offered me Turbo every chance we had, and last week I won the first round at Dodge on Turbo, Heber and Castle Rock all on Turbo.”
Two-time World Champion Smith never second-guessed letting Thorp take his A and B string horses.
“It’s pretty ironic—in 2021, I had Rooster, Turbo and Midas, and Turbo was already hurt for several months, and Rooster and Midas got hurt in June,” Smith explained. “So when I left for the Fourth of July run, I had to borrow Wesley’s horses for two weeks. If there’s anybody I’d enjoy doing this with, it’s Wesley. He ropes great, and rides great. What goes around comes around.”
Both Smith and Thorp are veterans, so they knew this play long before the summer started.
“The first year we buddied, in 2020, we traded horses before the summer to get a chance to ride each other’s horses in case we needed to borrow one. When it came full circle a year later, I rode him at two or three jackpots, and I fell in love with him. Before we left for the summer this year, we traded horses again, and I only ran one steer because that’s all I needed—he just feels that good. When I got on him last week, we picked right back up. He’s such a cool horse, and I don’t think anybody is higher on him than I am.”
SJR Play The Diamond is another good one that Smith thinks could be his next great.
“Carlos de Silva sold me that horse as a 3-year-old,” Smith explained. “He sent me a video of his son riding him around roping a lead steer, and his son was 6 or 7, and the horse was 3. I sold him to a good friend of mine, Chet Pharies. Kenny Reeves had come over here from Arizona to a school, and I’d just gone to a couple rodeos on the horse, and he’d done good. Kenny liked him, and wanted him from Chet, so he bought him. A few years go by, and Kenny wasn’t using him, so he asked me if I’d ride him. I thought I’d use him as a practice horse, not expecting him to be as mature as he was. I never thought he’d be so fast and smooth, and he’s kid gentle. I called Kenny and said, ‘This horse has a chance to be great. If I didn’t have Turbo, I didn’t know of another one I’d rather get on.’ Thorp got in the jam he was in, and I called Kenny and said, ‘Hey before you turn on Cheyenne and watch your horse go in the short round, I want you to know I’m letting Wesley ride him there.””
Thorp expects to have Mabel, the horse he bought from Kollin VonAhn and Kaleb Driggers before 2023’s NFR, back in time for the Northwest run in two weeks, but until then? Jump-riding the Horse of the Year isn’t a bad thing.
—TRJ—
