story by Riata Christiansen
Garrett Riding lives to rodeo. After spending some of his childhood in North Dakota and Pennsylvania where opportunities for him to rodeo were few and far between, Garrett is more than happy to eat, sleep and breathe rodeo. The 13 year old from St. George, Utah attends Desert Hills Middle School where he maintains a 4.0 GPA and his favorite subject is science. In the Utah Junior High School Rodeo Association, Garrett competes in saddle bronc steer riding, chute dogging, tie-down roping, goat tying, ribbon roping and team roping, with team roping being his favorite. He has started this year off with a bang winning 11 buckles, 3 saddles and multiple other prizes. He is currently sitting 3rd in a tight race for Boys All-Around.
He comes from a rodeo family and his idol is has grandpa, Jeff Barlow. His Grandpa Jeff inspired a love of rodeo in Garrett but the rest of his family rodeos as well. Garrett has an older brother Carson that competes in high school, a younger sister Jacie that competes in junior high as well and the youngest sister, Kylie that competes in the Utah 5th and Under Association. The only pastime he allows to distract him at all is hunting, and even that is minimal compared to rodeo. When he was younger he enjoyed shows like Looney Tunes on T.V., but now his favorite show is Total Team Roper.
He is kind hearted and fun to be around. He tries to stay out of the house at all times and is glad to live in St. George where it’s warm most of the time. When it’s time to rodeo Garrett is focused and driven. His favorite quote is simply, “Stay focused.” His ability to do just that along with his confidence allow him to push through and adapt to anything that might get thrown his way and still succeed. His goals for this year include making it to nationals in at least 3 events. He wants to continue to rodeo through high school and move on to the PRCA.
Garrett has two horses. A buckskin gelding he calls “Bucky” that he uses to goat tie and head on; and a mare called “Matilda” that he uses to tie-down. After losing their older tie down horse, the brothers stepped up to the challenge and started training Matilda to work a rope. Garrett was excited when their hard work paid off and he placed in his last two rodeos using Matilda.
Garrett enjoys being a part of the UJHRA because of the competition, opportunity to compete and excel and all the friends he makes there.
