It’s a long, dusty road that ends in Edmonton.
But don’t tell Tanner Milan it isn’t worth every ounce of blood, sweat and try he put into a full Canadian Pro Rodeo Association (CPRA) season to be 2014 national steer wrestling champion.
The 31-year-old Cochranite prevailed at the 41st annual Canadian Finals Rodeo (CFR) in Alberta’s capital, winning his second Canadian steer wrestling championship in three years.
“It’s outstanding. I don’t even know how to explain it right now,” Milan said hours after winning the title on the competition’s final day Nov. 9. “I absolutely can’t believe it. I’m kind of stuck for words.”
Riding Paul Guenthner’s CPRA award-winning horse, Itzy, Milan was up against it on the show’s final day.
Needing a win in the sixth (last) go, he put up his second-best time of the week – a 3.5-second run that was best on the day putting him over the top. He won CFR Day 1 on Nov. 5 with a 3.4-second pass.
“Coming down today (Nov. 9), I knew I had to win the round and I needed some other stuff to go in my favour. It happens I was the last guy out today,” Milan recalled. “Right before we rode in, my brother Baillie slapped me on the leg and said; ‘Tanner, you go after it. You don’t back off.’
“That’s what I did. I got a hell of a start and made a good run, and everything worked in my favour.”
Baillie Milan was Tanner’s hazer all week at #CFR41. As the man tasked with keeping steers on line for the catch, he did his job perfectly, earning some post-CFR refreshments on his brother’s tab. When the dust settled, Tanner Milan’s combined CFR and CPRA season earnings totalled $64,618.90, just ahead of Neepawa, Manitoba’s, Justin Miller at $62,023.53.
The Canadian championship puts the icing on a season Tanner Milan set out to win from the first CPRA steer wrestling event in April.
“I was so set on winning it this year and that’s what I was practising for. I absolutely put all my time into it,” he relayed. “My mind was on winning first up here this year.”
But, as in everything rodeo, it didn’t come easy.
“I don’t know what the heck. I had some good runs and I had some bobbles too,” he said of two CFR passes in the mid-teens.
“It was a battle right to the end. I put some pressure on and then I’d mess up and someone else would put some pressure on and then it just kind of kept switching back and forth like that.”
But he came out on top, 2014 Canadian steer wrestling champion. To the victor go the spoils.
“There’s always the ups and downs,” he surmised. “But you just have to ride out the high times and enjoy every moment of it.
“We’re going to go out and have a good time.”
That’ll take the edge off that long, dusty road. For sure.
