“I’m nervous and excited and glad I get to go,” said 24-year-old Ilene Choal, talking about her first trip to the Ram Circuit Finals in Oklahoma City, Okla. “It’s a lot to get my mind around.” Ilene is in her first year of dental school at the University of Nebraska. “The stars are lining up for me. April is the worst month of our curriculum with exams and finals. It just happens to be the only week for the next month that I don’t have an exam.”
Right up until she leaves for Oklahoma, Ilene will be studying and preparing for the last stretch of her first year at the University of Nebraska. “We’re going in as a dental student, that’s my full time job,” she said. Taking 21 credits, her classes include Pathology, Immunology, Microbiology, Physiology, Anatomy, Occlusion, Operative, and Histology. “It’s a set up program, so everybody takes the same course load. It’s a really rigorous year because we take our boards after the first year, not the second like most schools. I’ve been told it quiets down after this.”
From Laramie, Wyo., Ilene and her younger sister, Joann, learned how to ride at their grandparents ranch near Sheridan. “My cousins were entered in a little rodeo and I wanted to enter. My grandparents said if I could learn the pattern, I could compete. My cousin stayed up all night long showing me how to make the barrel pattern. I showed my grandparents the next morning that I knew the pattern and they entered me. That was when I was 11.” Her parents, Ross and Cheryl Hilman, never competed in rodeo, so it was a learning curve for the entire family. “My dad works for the state archaeologist and mom works in the engineering department and runs the computer lab at the University of Wyoming. My dad grew upon on a ranch and got away from horses and through his kids he ended up right back in them.”
Ross and Cheryl hauled Ilene to all the Wyoming high school rodeos and weekly 4-H practices. Joann went another direction, competing in shot put and recently completing a year abroad in South Korea as a foreign exchange student. During Ilene’s senior year in high school, she bought a horse named Zip. The pair rodeoed for the University of Wyoming while Ilene completed a degree in archeology and they made the College Finals during her junior year in 2010. “It’s taken both of us learning each other and getting comfortable. I’ve learned a lot as a rider and he’s come a long ways.”
Although she liked her career options in archeology, Ilene realized that she wanted a career that would allow her to rodeo. “I really like working with my hands – and I wanted a hands-on career. As a dentist, I can work with my hands, help people, and have the flexibility I need to rodeo.”
She also wants to make the NFR, and started the process by getting her permit this past year. “I was planning on filling my permit this summer – that was my goal. I ended up filling it a lot quicker than I expected. I learned about the Mountain States Circuit Finals, and had a little less than a month and a half to qualify before I went to school. My husband (Tyler) and I sat down and made a plan. We qualified and then we came to Lincoln and I hoped that I had enough money made to go. That’s how I got there.”
Tyler and Ilene have been together for eight years. They started dating in high school and got married four years ago. “He’s been my rock and best friend through everything. He’s not a horse person, but he helps me in the arena and will feed and helps me exercise Zip. He helped me to figure out how to make rodeo possible in the summer so we could make the Circuit Finals. Ilene and Zip made the trip to Rock Springs and won the average. “Now we’re off to Oklahoma.” Ilene and Christi Loflin represented the Mountain States Circuit in Oklahoma City.” She was the first person that said hi to me at a pro rodeo. She’s been great about making sure I felt welcome and congratulating me on chasing my dreams.”
Part of chasing those dreams for Ilene included overcoming Dyslexia. “At the end of my third grade year I was almost completely illiterate,” she said. “The teacher told my parents that I would never learn to read.” Thanks to family support, and Ilene’s determination, she is now a student in one of the best dental programs in the nation. “I think a person’s success has to do with how dedicated a person is to their dreams and how much work they are willing to put into achieving those dreams. I dreamed about being a dentist and someday competing at the NFR and I am working towards reaching those goals. Being dyslexic has made me have to work harder but has not stopped me from achieving what I set out to do.”
