story by Ruth Nicolaus
Caseyn Pearson gets a lot of quality windshield time with his dad.
That’s because the Idaho Cowboys Association member, a saddle bronc rider, has as his traveling partner his dad, Dax Pearson, a former bullfighter and pickup man.
And Caseyn loves it. “We just know each other so well. There’s never a dull moment. We’re always talking, or we’ll pull over and do something, like go swimming. He usually won’t get in, but he’ll stop and let me swim while he messes with the dogs.”
The 20 year old cowboy, a resident of Emmett, Idaho, has been an ICA member since 2019, when he rode novice broncs. This fall, he’s a sophomore at Treasure Valley Community College in Ontario, Oregon, majoring in agribusiness. In college rodeo, he competes not only in the saddle bronc riding, but as a tie-down roper and team roper.
As a college freshman, he won the Northwest Region’s saddle bronc title and went to the College National Finals Rodeo. Bronc riding is his strength. “It’s the event I like the most.”
This summer, he worked for Matt Askew, doing construction. He enjoyed the variety the work provided, doing something different every day.
As of press time, he was ranked first in the ICA standings, with four more rodeos to go. This year is his fourth qualification to the ICA finals; he qualified in 2020-2022.
Caseyn’s favorite meal is steak and potatoes, cooked on the Treager. He loves anything with Oreos: Oreo cake, Oreo pie, or just as cookies, so long as there’s milk with them. He likes the original kind double stuffed.
For fun, he likes to swim and fish, catching large mouth bass, blue gill and trout. He enjoys movies with comedies being his favorite and Adam Sandler his favorite comedian.
If he were given $1 million, he’d buy a new house (in Montana or in the Sweet, Idaho area), a Dodge Cummins 3500, and some horses.
He also competes in PRCA rodeos as a permit holder.
He hasn’t had any serious injuries from rodeo yet, but broke his leg while playing football his freshman year of high school. The broken leg kept him off bucking horses for a year; he didn’t ride broncs till the spring of his sophomore year.
His mom, Theresa, wasn’t thrilled that her boy was riding broncs. “I entered some rodeos, then started getting on without telling her, till she finally got over it.”
Caseyn’s dad Dax and uncle Drew were bullfighters, and when his dad was done fighting bulls, he became a pickup man. As a kid, Caseyn loved going to rodeos with his dad. His uncle Drew is his college rodeo coach at Treasure Valley.
Caseyn won the ICA novice saddle bronc riding in 2020-2021, and in 2022, finished third in the open.
He has a younger sister, Rainee, who is a freshman at Treasure Valley Community College this fall.
