story by Lindsay Humphrey
Few people can practice with their team mate only a hand full of times and still find two heels more often than not. That’s the case for header Brodee Snow and his partner, Jordin Lovins, in the OHSRA. The pair met in junior high rodeo and teamed up as freshman. They are the reigning OHSRA team roping champions after placing first in round one and third in round two to clinch the average. “My main goal was to win state finals this year. I’ve gone for three years and I ended up fourth at the last two. When we started this year, I told myself that I wasn’t going to miss a steer all season so that we could win first,” said the Bentonville, Arkansas, cowboy. And that’s exactly what Brodee did.
The OHSRA was one of very few states that actually got to hold their year-end finals. They even had one more regular season rodeo in the spring beforehand. “This COVID stuff has been pretty weird. When it first started, I couldn’t even go to the sale barn and work for a while. We couldn’t hardly get gas anywhere either.” Brodee completed his first year of homeschooling with Epic Charter Schools through the pandemic. It was a blessing for many reasons. “Since I worked online, my school didn’t change a whole lot. I might have actually gotten more work done quicker because of everything.”
Homeschooling lends itself both to flexible work hours and rodeoing in a completely different state. “I rodeo in Oklahoma mainly because of the competition, there is so much more there. If I’m not roping with people who are challenging me, then I’m not going to get any better. I wanted to go to the best place I could to find a partner.” Brodee’s older sister, Bailee, 25, did high school rodeo in Arkansas. “I rodeoed in Arkansas in sixth grade, then took a year off, and started in Oklahoma as an eighth grader.”
The son of a horse trainer, his mom, Shawnna, and a welder, his dad, Hank, Brodee has an eye for good horseflesh. “We raise a lot of our own horses to then train and sell. My parents have always kept me in horses and shown me the best way to do things.” Hank used to rope quite a bit, but he’s assumed more of the chute help and coaching role in recent years. Brodee does his best to rope all day, every day when he gets the chance. “You have to rope every day, nobody is going to hand anything to you in rodeo, you have to work for it. Some people will go to jackpots and they’re lucky sometimes, but if you really want to be good you have to rope every day.” Knowing who is going to be able to rope two feet for your head catch is another aspect of team roping Brodee put a lot of time into.
“My partner is from Canadian, Texas, and we’ve practiced together maybe three times in the three years we’ve been partners. It’s hard.” Jordin lives almost 8 hours away from Brodee, but it’s evidently a match made in team roping heaven. “I feel like we get better every time we go. It’s difficult not getting to practice with him all the time, but I just have to trust that he is practicing as hard as I am.” Evidently that’s the case as Brodee and Jordin nabbed the state team roping title yet again. Thanks to COVID-19, high school nationals moved to the Lazy E Arena in Guthrie, Oklahoma. It’s much closer to both of these competitors and perhaps that lent itself to the team making the short round at nationals this year. They took home eighteenth in the average.
