Spurred On

When Fred Whitfield defends his pro rodeo title this month in Las Vegas, he'll be bucking more than just tradition.

In April 1995 Fred Whitfield—who had won the Professional Rodeo Cowboy Association's rookie of the year award in 1990 and a calf-roping title in 1991—was ending his relationship with a longtime girlfriend and had temporarily quit the rodeo after getting off to the worst start of his career. Four months into the year-round season, with barely $7,500 in earnings, he wasn't even among the top fifty ropers. Rumors abounded that he would retire. Paul Asay, then a writer for the PRCA's Prorodeo Sports News, phoned Whitfield at his ranch in Hockley, just north of Houston, to verify the story and received what he describes as "a good-natured berating." Whitfield returned to the circuit at the beginning of the summer and two months later clawed his way back up to the top fifteen. He continued climbing for the rest of the season, and by the end of October he had claimed the top spot. And each week, according to Asay, Whitfield would call and jokingly ask the writer where he stood in the standings. "When I get that gold buckle," he teased Asay, "I'm going to say, 'It's hell going from worst to first.'" While accepting the massive belt buckle for winning his second calf-roping championship at the National Finals Rodeo that December, he kept his vow. Those cowboys who had counted Whitfield out would watch him go on to win additional calf-roping titles in 1996 and 1999, and he now reigns as the PRCA's first African American world champion all-around cowboy.

The 33-year-old Whitfield, who is an imposing figure at six feet two, 220 pounds, concedes that he dressed down Asay pretty well over the retirement rumors but halfheartedly denies making those weekly calls. He believes that such stories give the wrong impression about him and belong in the past. "I've learned a lot since I've been rodeoing, and I seldom tell you how good I rope. I let my roping do my talking," he says. "I'm sure that at one time I was a twenty-two-year-old little arrogant son of a gun just like everybody else. Now that I've won five gold buckles, I feel like I don't have a whole lot to prove." One of the few high-ranking black men in a white man's sport—albeit one who insists he be accepted as an athlete first and an African American second—he says his ferociously competitive spirit contributes to his image of being cocky and brash. That's one reason why he has no close friends on the circuit, he adds. But he also alludes to the part his race plays in his reputation, although he declines to cite a specific example or even come right out and say it. "It's a touchy subject with me, and I don't talk about it a lot," he says. "It hasn't been easy. Deep down inside, I know some of the things I've said are true, and that's why I decline to talk about them now. Because the minute you go writing it, then I'm gonna have to answer more questions about it and more questions about it, and then there's gonna be a big blowup. And I don't want that. I just don't want to have to deal with it. Maybe one of these days, when I'm done rodeoing, I'll tell my story."

Whitfield demands that he be judged only for his talent, which is something nobody questions. "He's the best I've ever seen," says Asay. "He has a big combination of strength and speed, which you have to have for calf-roping. He's always well mounted and so fast on the ground, and he has a real desire to win." Whitfield will need all of those skills to defend his all-around title at the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas from December 1 through 10. At the end of October—with a week's worth of rodeos left to go in the season—Whitfield had won $129,516 calf-roping, surpassing the record he set last year. To win the all-around title, though, he must compete in at least two events, and his team-roping tallies have been weak enough that, with $133,991 total earnings, he trailed both Scott Johnston of Gustine ($168,693, primarily in saddle bronc riding) and Trevor Brazile of Decatur ($144,335, mostly in calf-roping and steer-roping). Whitfield should win another gold belt buckle for calf-roping, but retaining his all-around title is a long shot. "I'll have to rope my butt off," he admits. "I've got only an outside chance."

Given his competitiveness, it comes as no surprise that Whitfield has excelled at calf-roping, which is arguably rodeo's most difficult event because it requires several distinct skills. Though Whitfield figures that the horse is 75 percent to 80 percent of winning, he has mastered exactly what he has to do on his end. When he first gets to an arena, he checks out the calf he has drawn. If he has seen it before, he'll know how it performs. If not, he asks other cowboys about it and studies it. During the actual "go-around," the calf gets a small lead out of the box, so Whitfield's horse has to react instantly to give him the quickest throw. However, if he leaves the box before the calf has finished its head start, he's penalized ten seconds. Whitfield's hand-eye coordination comes into play as he lassos the calf: The horse stops, and with the rope fastened to the saddle horn, the cowboy dismounts and runs down the rope to tie up three of the calf's legs with a "pigging string." He then throws his hands up to show that he has finished. (If the calf kicks free within six seconds, the roper is disqualified.) His time depends on his momentum and position when he reaches the calf, as well as his speed and strength. The best cowboys can do it all in less than seven seconds. "From the dismount to the time you throw your hands up, you have to be aware of everything going on," Whitfield says. "You never get the same go-around from a horse, and you never get the same calf twice. That's why you'll never see a flawless run."

Despite his calf-roping record this season, he has struggled in his second event. He began the year team-roping regularly as a header, the cowboy who first ropes a steer around the head, horns, or neck before his partner, the heeler, lassos the hind legs. He expected to be competitive in that event, but his success suffered because he couldn't keep a steady heeling teammate. "Most guys who team-rope don't want a two-event partner," he says. "And team-roping took away from my main event. Now I'm focused on my calf-roping. But I think I'm gonna try to win calf-roping another two or three years and then win team-roping, just to make a point." He speaks softly, without a trace of braggadocio, but those are the kind of remarks that feed his critics. That and the fact that he has been known to swagger or become testy now and again, to exuberantly throw his hat in the air after a good run, hotdogging in front of the crowd. This year, though, Whitfield married his girlfriend of three years, Cassie Loegel, and became a father. He has also become a regular churchgoer. While none of this has dampened his competitive fire, his personality has mellowed. He talks about how he never considered himself an all-around contender until last year and says he has already met all of his goals, so any other titles are icing on the cake.

As for his race, he'd rather talk about a black couple from New York City who knew nothing about rodeo but went to the National Finals Rodeo last year to see him, the growing number of black faces in the stands, or the gradual increase in black PRCA cowboys. After he won his all-around title, Whitfield became only the fourth African American inducted into the National Cowboy Hall of Fame in Oklahoma City. The others are Taylor's Bill Pickett, who early in the twentieth century popularized the sport of bulldogging, now known as steer wrestling, making him the only individual to whom any of the seven chief rodeo events can be traced; Californian Jesse Stahl, considered the best saddle bronc rider of the same era; and bull rider Myrtis Dightman of Houston, who in 1966 became the first black cowboy to reach the National Finals Rodeo.

Whitfield owes much of his success to his relentless regimen, which he traces back to his childhood. He was born in Houston, but after his parents divorced, his mother raised him in Cypress. He began learning to rope and ride when he was six from his thirteen-year-old friend Roy Moffitt, the son of a Houston oilman for whom Whitfield's mother worked. Whitfield was nine when he competed in his first National Little Britches Rodeo Association event. Every day after school, he'd get in forty practice runs, and when he worked on a ranch after high school, he roped about two hundred calves a day. Even now his routine is relentless. In his official PRCA biography, under the entry for "special interests," where most cowboys include their hobbies, Whitfield lists only one thing: rodeo. On his Hockley spread, which he bought six years ago, he does "run after run, day after day," to prepare for the National Finals Rodeo. "There's no way of knowing how many calves I've roped, and that's what it takes," he declares.