story by Ruth Nicolaus
Rex Day is in his last year of high school rodeo.
The Bartlett, Neb. cowboy, a member of the Nebraska High School Rodeo Association, is a senior, competing in the tie-down roping, team roping and steer wrestling.
Of his events, steer wrestling is his strength. “As of lately, I’ve developed into a better bulldogger,” he said. “That’s what I enjoy the most.” As soon as he and header Dane Pokorny are done with team roping practice, they switch to steer wrestling, with the help of Dane’s dad, Brad, a former steer wrestler.
Brad and Paula own the horse that Rex steer wrestles on. Shorty, a red roan, has carried many a bulldogger and has won a couple saddles doing it. Shorty is consistent, Rex said. “It’s almost that he knows what’s going to happen every run, before you do. He gives you the same shot, every time.”
Shorty is more than twenty years old, but he doesn’t let his age show, he said. “Some of the time he acts like a five-year-old. He’ll dang sure let you know he’s the king of the pen He’s the first to feed and asserts his dominance.” Shorty even bucks a little bit yet, like he’s enjoying what he’s doing. “Every once in a while, you’ll crawl off him (during a steer wrestling run), and as he runs down the pen, he’ll buck,” Rex said. “I guess he knows he’s having fun.” Two people have won state steer wrestling titles on Shorty: Rex’s older brother, Lane, in 2011, and Zane Patrick, who was co-champion in 2017.
For the tie-down roping, Rex rides a bay horse named Hector, and for the team roping, he rides an older red roan horse, who is “super broke, that I can do about anything on,” who can head or heel for him. The mare has two names: Roanie, when she’s being nice, and Princess, because sometimes “she can be a royal pain,” Rex said.
He loves being at school. As a senior at Wheeler Central Public School, he loves shop classes and has built a variety of things, including ranch items, like continuous fence panels, barn doors, panels, gates, “all kinds of things, whatever I can stay busy with.” He’s also used the plasma cutter to make signs, like ranch signs that are hung by the highway to show where people live, and school pride signs.
Rex likes all his classes, but the toughest might be English, just because he’s a hands-on kind of guy. “If I can touch it, I can do better at it.” In English, “it all runs together and gets boring.”
In school, he played football and is in FFA. He served as vice-president for two years; this year he is parliamentarian. He’s been on his chapter’s animal management team, which has qualified for state twice.
For fun, he loves to hunt deer, coyotes, and raccoons, and hanging out with friends. He and his buddies cruise the streets of Bartlett, which doesn’t take long, “all three” streets, he points out, laughing.
The best meal his mom makes is steak, medium rare, with a pat of butter on top, and a side of cheesy potatoes, washed down with iced tea or Mountain Dew.
His favorite trip was to Indianapolis in 2018, to the National FFA convention. It was his first time on an airplane, and while in Indy, they went to some cool places, like the Indianapolis Raceway and the state capital.
Rex will go to college this fall, either in Nebraska or Wyoming, and hopes to work towards being an electrician. He day works for other ranchers in the area and helps out on his family’s ranch, the Plus Seven, which was homesteaded by his grandpa, Lester Day.
In addition to Lane, his older brother, he has an older sister, Bailey, who teaches school in Humphrey, Neb. He is the son of Larry and Kaye Day.
