story by Lily Weinacht
Kayla Olson went into the KHSRA state finals leading the barrel racing and pole bending, ready to defend her 2015 KHSRA Pole Bending Champion title. The 18-year-old senior from Coldwater, Kan., competes in all of the girls rodeo events in high school, also holding cards with the CPRA and KPRA. She names team roping as her favorite event, heading for her partner, Cheyenne Larson. “I get more excited to team rope than anything else!” she says. “When I first started roping, I hated it because I never caught, so I quit and didn’t breakaway rope again until I was a freshman. But when I picked up team roping as a junior, I picked it up easy. I also love the cutting. My mom cut in high school, but I was focused on being a barrel racer for years. Once I got that down, I started cutting, and it’s so much fun, I wish I’d started sooner!”
Kayla’s decision to rodeo was a natural fit with her family’s ranching lifestyle. She was riding as soon as she could walk, and before that, she shared the saddle with her mom, going out with her parents to work on her grandpa’s ranch. “I grew up doing rodeo, so it’s who I am,” Kayla explains. “I really enjoy the competition, and it gives you a rush that you don’t get with other sports. And no one is forcing me to rodeo – I do it of my own choice, and I get the credit for it.” Yet she also credits her parents, Tim and Terri, with her success. “They take me everywhere and do what they can to allow me to rodeo. I want to thank my aunts and uncles for helping me grow as a rider and competitor, and I also look up to Marc and Kim Harland. They own the horse I run barrels and poles on, Annie. Marc came up to me at a junior rodeo and asked if I needed a horse to ride, and I’ve been riding Annie since I was a freshman. It’s been a blessing to have a horse as nice as her.”
In addition to Annie, Kayla rides Tuffy, a breakaway roping horse given to Kayla by her aunt Megan. She team ropes off a variety of horses, most recently using her brother’s horse, Eddie, and tying goats off Marc’s horse, Pepper. “My cutting horse, Peach, is owned by Cleon Parkins, and he helps me out and hauls her to the close rodeos for me,” says Kayla. “Annie lives in Buffalo, Oklahoma, so the Harlands either haul her for me when their kids have junior high rodeos, or she stays with me. I’m very blessed to have people that are willing to help me in any way possible, and I hope someday that I will have a horse like these ones that I can let someone ride.”
Kayla graduated from South Central High School in May, where she ran track and cross country, and served as a founding officer of her local FFA chapter. She recently served as a Southwest District FFA officer, and this year, she got her FFA state degree, and won her state proficiency in equine science through rodeo, also winning at the district and chapter levels. She’s using her summer break to work on her grandfather’s ranch with her older brother, Robert, who is a senior this fall at Northwestern Oklahoma State University. He tie-down roped in high school, and continues to team rope in the USTRC.
Prior to starting school this fall at Southwestern Oklahoma State University, Kayla is competing in the NHSFR, and hopes to compete on the SWOSU team on her mare, Grace. “She’s out of Frenchmans Guy, and I’m just now getting her trained, so I hope to do college rodeo on her my second semester,” says Kayla. “I’m majoring in Pharmacy, so I plan to rodeo my first two years of school and then focus on my career. I think it’s very important to focus on the bigger picture, and I can rodeo forever!”
