story by Lily Weinacht
Mullin, Texas, native Sassy Wilson is leading the goat tying in the AJRA 13-15 age division. The 15-year-old also competes in barrel racing and pole bending, but goat tying is unquestionably her favorite. “Whatever you put in to it, you get out of it,” says Sassy, who is the second generation of her family to compete in the AJRA. Her dad, Will Wilson, competed in the AJRA growing up and went on to ride bulls and rope calves, and her mom, Mary Hamilton, was a professional barrel racer and trained barrel horses.
Sassy knew rodeo was for her by the time she was 3. She’s starting on her fourth season in the AJRA, and also competes in the CTYRA and THSRA Region 10. Her motivation is the thrill of competing — and 20 horses depending on her for exercise and care. “I don’t really do anything else in life. It just keeps me going all the time. I always have something to do, and I’m never bored! I wake up in the morning, feed and unblanket horses, do some homework, and ride about seven horses a day.” Her 20-year-old barrel horse, Buddy, recently returned to competing after recovering from a broken cannon bone. He worked around the injury so well that Sassy didn’t even know something was wrong until just a few weeks before the 2017 AJRA finals. She had to forego barrel racing at the finals, but Buddy is sound again and running hard. “One goat horse I’m riding now, Boogie, is a 6-year-old little cow horse, and my other goat horse I made Nationals on. Paint is a 13-hand crazy little Paint pony I bought off a trick rider and turned into a goat horse. I run poles on a little black mare that we call Noche. I won reserve champion on her at the junior rodeos in Region 10.”
Sassy and her family live outside of town, where she has several arenas and a track to ride her horses on, or pastures when they need a change of scenery. Her 18-year-old brother, Vegas, is going to college in Sweetwater, but he comes to watch Sassy’s rodeos when she’s in West Texas. A freshman, Sassy is homeschooled through Ogburn School, doing her courses online. She enjoys science, and was able to take her Christmas break early to go to Las Vegas for the WNFR with her best friend Rainey Skelton and her family. “We went to the NFR for four rounds and the Cinch Boyd Gaming Chute-Out, and we went shopping,” says Sassy. “We had a lot of fun, and we were there when two arena records were set in the barrel racing.” Sassy and Rainey met through rodeo many years ago, and Sassy also looks up to Rainey’s dad, eight-time world champion Rich Skelton. “He’s my hero, because he never stops working, and he helps me out.”
When she’s not with her horses, Sassy trades her boots for roller skates and meets friends at a roller rink in town on weekends when she doesn’t have rodeos. One of her goals for this rodeo season is making it to state in all of her events, particularly goat tying. She competed at the NJHFR her eighth-grade year and placed in the top 20 the first round. “I have a nice colt coming up, and I really want to push myself to make sure she turns out to be a really nice barrel horse. And I want to win the 13-15 goat tying in the AJRA,” Sassy finishes. “I want to thank my grandpa (Larry Hada) and grandma (Cassandra Hamilton) for taking me everywhere. I couldn’t do this without all of them.”
