Distinctly Montana Magazine
Issue link: https://digital.distinctlymontana.com/i/20776
“it’s at least as much fun to watch as it is to compete.” NOAH CLAYTON and rodeo champions to ordinary folk looking for some fun and thrills. Leadville, CO, has hosted its own annual ski joring event since the 1940s—the oldest known continu- ous competition in America. In the Treasure State, ski jorers test themselves in annual events held primarily in Red Lodge and Whitefish. Ski joring came to Red Lodge in the early 1960s, with somewhat informal annual competitions held as a wacky ad- dition to the town’s annual winter carnival, said Tammy Ste- vens, a Red Lodge Realtor, board member of the Red Lodge Ski Joring Association, and a semi-retired ski joring champ. MERV COLEMAN DISTINCTLY MONTANA | DIGITAL Want more ski joring action? Go to www.distinctlymontana.com/skijoring111 MERV COLEMAN of the main drag. The grand prize, Stevens said: a bottle of whiskey, which competitors might have wished they’d had a pull or two off of before the race. By 1980 those competitions had evolved into the National Finals Ski Joring Races, by comparison a much more serious, highly organized though possibly even wilder event. Competitors, sepa- rated into classes to recognize age and skill level, race on a horseshoe-shaped course carefully designed to be both technically challenging and highly entertaining for racers and spectators, with at least four jumps to fly off of and two dozen or more gates to slalom through in roughly 16 seconds of filling-jiggling mayhem. “They used to have cutter races and snowshoeing races (during the carnival,) and during a break in these events several skiers from Red Lodge Mountain had been talked into letting a couple of cowboys from the Roping and Rid- ing Club pull them behind horses in straight-pull heats,” Stevens said. Straight pull meaning just that: a guy on a horse pulling a guy on skis as fast as possible straight down the middle 16 There are other events, too, like the longest-jump com- petition, that add to the fun. “It’s at least as much fun to watch as it is to compete,” Stevens said. “There’s the thrill of the speed of the horse, and the skill of the skier negotiating the course. It’s a team effort, the rider putting his or her horse in the correct place to allow the skier to successfully get through the course without losing the rope. “Oh, and then there are the wrecks,” she added. Hundreds of people turn out every year to watch Red Lodge’s ski joring races. Notoriously generous sponsors continue to pony up to make the races possible and for the association to offer serious cash awards and other prizes—up to $20,000 annually, Stevens said—in order to draw top-notch competitors from around the country. DISTINCTLY MONTANA • WINTER 2011