There’s a lot of cheering going on in the community of Armstrong, B.C and Valleyview, Alberta today.
The Armstrong boys, Russell and Graham, and Valleyview’s Clint Davis have captured the Team Cattle Penning Open Class event at the Calgary, Stampede.
The trio penned all 12 in four rides with a total time of 137.650 (seconds), which works out to a blistering average time per ride of 34.41 (seconds).
Russell Armstrong tells Rural Roots Canada the final go-around went very well with two cows at the front of the herd, one of which really stood out.
“So he (Clint) dove in and drove ’em and Graham hooked with them and they came up together with those two so I went in and looked for the third one, couldn’t see it and by the time that they had turned around I still didn’t see the cow,” says Russell who provided the running commentary. “They yelled for me to get out because they had seen it. So I ran out of the herd, Clint came in and grabbed the third one, he pulled all three of them, what it amounted to and then we rode up to the pen. They didn’t give us a ton of trouble we swept them pretty fast. They challenged the hole a bit but we handled them and we got them in the pen and she was over.”
Graham Armstrong says this is near the top of his achievements in cattle penning.
“It’s hard to say what’s number one and what’s not number one,” says Graham. “Anytime you win with your brother. I’ve won two other times with my twin brother this is the first time I have won it with Russ, this is the first time he has won the Open and I know he wanted that really bad, so it’s really special.”
Clint Davis says the three of them have had some good runs since they started riding together three years ago.
“We’ve been close before, had lots of good runs, good chemistry with the team and it’s nice that it’s come together,” says Davis.
The three are humble champions to say the least. They say they owe their success to a lot of people. The brothers are thankful to Brian Dick who is part owner of the horses they ride. Graham says he has done so much for them and their penning.
Russell was also quick to thank Ron Mathison from Calfrac, who sponsors the event and the other big supporters at the Calgary Stampede, including Ron Scott Financial and everyone else who makes the event happen.
“This sport couldn’t be possible without all of the donations and sponsorship that we do get, and it’s just fantastic, we would like to thank the Stampede for having this event, it’s a big deal to us.”
It also turns out Graham had a friend looking out for him on the final run.
“I want to thank my friend Tom, who lent me his horse, my horse was a little gassed out, so we wouldn’t be here without him either.”
Rural Roots Canada`s coverage of the 2015 Calgary Stampede brought to you by:
