story by Ruth Nicolaus
CodiAnne Christensen doesn’t let the grass grow under her feet for long.
The breakaway roper, a member of the Rocky Mountain Pro Rodeo Association, likes to stay busy. She has a full time job, rodeos, trains horses, and produces two rodeo events a year.
She grew up in Grace, Idaho, a ranch and horse girl. Horses and rodeo were put on the back burner during college, and when she was 24, she learned to rope.
After earning an animal science/agricultural business degree from Utah State University, she lived in Billings for several years, working in the animal nutrition field. Two years ago, she moved to Riverside, Utah, and now is in the medical field, as a sales representative for a pain medication for cancer patients. She travels across Utah, meeting with pain and oncologist specialists.
When she’s home, she loves to work with horses. Her fiancé, Shawn Judkins, helps her with her colts, starting them, and she puts the finishing touches on them.
Her current breakaway horse is a nine-year-old solid sorrel gelding named Sparky. She and Shawn bought him as a four-year-old and finished him for reined cow horse (Shawn’s specialty), then CodiAnne started roping on him. Sparky is the perfect breakaway horse, even though he may not act like it. “If you watch him lope or back into the box, people think there’s no way he can be a breakaway horse. He is so lazy,” CodiAnne said. “But once he’s loaded in the box, and if there’s anything to do with a cow, he really, really livens up. He’s very explosive and really deceiving. He’s so smooth, he doesn’t look that fast. He has a lot of run to him and a big stop.”
CodiAnne has a production company, Shooting Star Roping Runs, which produces two events each year. In the fall, she puts on a big breakaway roping jackpot in Tremonton with over 300 ropers. As far as she knows, it’s the largest in the nation. In January, she produces the Big Loops and Bridle Horses Ranch Roping, a ranch roping limited to twenty teams with contestants judged on their stockmanship, horsemanship, and teamwork. This was the second year for the Big Loops event. Shawn participated in it on Sparky, and the horse won the Top Horse and Stock Horse at the Big Loops event last year.
CodiAnne competes at between ten and fifteen rodeos a year, and enjoys polishing her skills as a roper. “There’s always something to learn about it,” she said. “There’s always a way to better yourself.” The horses bring her great joy. “I really enjoy bringing the colts up through it. I enjoy roping off colts more than I do the finished horses. You can see how they are improving, and you get a sense of accomplishment with it.”
She and Shawn have a wedding date planned: September 23. He is a big part of her life, and she’s lucky to have him, she said. “He’s a big reason why I keep going. He’s a huge cheerleader, and helps me with horses. If I’m struggling roping, he’s there to help me fix it. He’s always encouraging me.”
