Houston Chronicle | HoustonChronicle.com and chron.com | Sunday, March 16, 2014 | Section G xxx Houston ChronicleHouston Chronicle Life & Entertainment

Smile1Photo contest: Houston’s top 20 rodeophotos are vying for a $500 prize in ourreader poll, and it’s your last chance to

vote for the winner. Voting ends tonight at midnight.See the entries at chron.com/RodeoPhoto.

The breaksof beinga broncrider

The breaks of being a bronc of being a bronc rider

Bobby Mote rememberssitting in his window seat ona plane to Seattle, helpless.The pain in his stomach wasbad and getting worse. Abuddy was just a row in frontof him, but Mote couldn’tlean forward or even raisehis voice to ask for help.

“I really, truly thought Iwas dying, and I couldn’t tellanybody about it,” he said.

The world-championbareback rider was leavingCalifornia and the RanchoMission Viejo Rodeo, wherea horse named Diaper Dutyhad reared up and slammedhim against the chute just be-fore his ride. Mote had beentrapped between the wall andhis bareback rigging, whichbored into his abdomen.

“It knocked the air outof me,” said Mote, who willcompete this week in thesemifinals at RodeoHouston.“I figured I had probablybroken some ribs. But alot of times in a case like

that, if you hurry up andride before the adrenalineruns off, you’ll do fine.”

He rode that horse,scored a respectable 76points, then caught aplane to the next rodeo.

A few hours later, Motewas having emergency sur-gery for a lacerated pancreas.The rigging had pushed hisinternal organs up against hisspine, and his pancreas wasso damaged, the surgeonshad to remove half of it.

He spent two weeks inthe hospital. But just threemonths later, Mote madeit to Las Vegas for the 2011National Finals Rodeo,the Super Bowl for rodeocowboys. He couldn’t situp until 30 days before thefinals, but he got on a horsein Vegas and finished theyear ranked third in theworld all-around standings.

“I’d lost so much condi-tioning and so much corestrength,” Mote said. “Itturned out fine, but that

RODEOHOUSTON

By Alyson Ward

BobbyMote bucks the perilsand hangs on for glory

Mote continues on G2

Bobby Mote,on NightmareRocket at theSan AntonioRodeo, hasbrokennumerousbones, torncartilageand had alaceratedpancreas. Buthe’s not givingup the rodeoanytime soon.Josh Huskin

OUCH!

Cowboy pains

1Skull: Fracturedwhen he hit an

arena post

2Neck: Bonespurs caused by

frequent whiplash

3Collarbone:Broken when

his horse tripped atRodeoHouston

4Right arm:Broken when

dragged by a horse

5Left arm:Went numb from

neck damage

6Right elbow:Frequent pain from

wear and tear

7Right wrist:All bones broken

8Ribs: Brokenseveral times

9Pancreas:Lacerated in a

chute injury

10Lower back:Two vertebrae

broken when a horsecrushed him

11Groin:Sports hernia

required surgery

12Hip: Torncartilage

around hip socket

13Left knee:Strained from

riding

14Right leg:Broken in a high

school rodeo; repairedwith rod and threescrews

15Left foot:Broken when

a horse rammed itagainst the gate

The music press made abig fuss over Miley Cyrusperforming a song lastweek in her underwear.Cyrus was backstagechanging outfits when herband kicked into the nextsong. The show must goon, so Cyrus ran out anddid the song in her under-wear. Shocking? Hardly.

Here’s one of my man-tras: The Beatles did thatfirst.

In the early ’60s, the

Beatles played three,sometimes four shows anight at the Kaiserkellerclub in Hamburg, Germa-ny. One night, a tipsy JohnLennon took the stage forthe Beatles’ fourthshow wearing onlyhis underpants,and a toilet seataround his neck.

Today’s triviaWhat is

the official

state sport of Texas? Hint:funnel cakes.

Speaking of mantrasYou know my mantra

in the drive-through —order what’s on the

sign outside. Stickwith what made ’emfamous. Pizza at Piz-za Hut, burgers atBurger King, chick-

en at Church’sChicken, you

get the idea.

As long as you can read,you can’t go wrong.

Except here are twononsignage specials offthe eaten path.

Chick-fil-A, whichdidn’t invent the chicken,just the chicken sand-wich, is offering a fishsandwich for Lent,through April 18. Thesandwich features codfilets, breaded and deep-fried, with two pickles ona toasted bun for $3.09.

The fish also is availableas a chicken substitute onsalads. Sorry, no grilledfish, just fried.

The fish sandwichdoesn’t taste like Chick-fil-A’s wildly popularchicken sandwich. Thebreading is different —the product comes pre-breaded from its source.Chick-fil-A hand-breadsits chicken in each restau-rant. There’s no spicy fishversion.

The fish sandwichhas 400 calories and 16fat grams. It’s good stuff.Everything is good stuff atChick-fil-A.

Fish always comes witha catch — the fish sand-wich is not available at allChick-fil-A restaurants.Call your local Chick-fil-Aand ask. Across the coun-try, only 350 of Chick-fil-A’s 1,800 restaurants havegone fishing.

KEN HOFFMAN Commentary

Hoffman continues on G9

Miley Cyrus is not the only one to take the stage in underwear

the Beatles’ fourth show wearing only his underpants, and a toilet seat around his neck.

Today’s trivia

order what’s on the sign outside. Stick with what made ’em famous. Pizza at Piz-za Hut, burgers at Burger King, chick-

en at Church’s Chicken, you

4B BeaumontEnterprise.comSunday, March 16, 2014

.,6*) Has scored big wins, suffered broken bones3:1;&!( 5; 5 %!:1$

Mote, 37, is one of theelite bareback riders in theworld. The Oregon native— who lives with his wifeand three kids near Ste-phenville — has won theworld championship inbareback riding four times,and he holds the lifetimeearnings record inhiseventwithmore than $2million.

Mote’s career has beena series of big wins andbroken bones, victoriesand surgeries. But as of-ten as he’s been hurt, hisfitness and core strengthhave probably saved him afew times, said Rick Foster,programdirectorof the Jus-tin Sports Medicine Team,which provides medicalcare and physical therapyto rodeo competitors.

“Bareback riding is defi-nitely the most strenuoussport in rodeo, and themost physically demand-ing,” Foster said. To com-pete these days, cowboyshave to be at peak strengthand fitness.

Rodeo is changing, andbareback riders today aremore athlete than dare-devil.

Motewas skinnyandun-athletic as a kid, and in theearly days of his rodeo ca-reer, guys likehimdidn’t doa lot of conditioning. Bare-back riders are supposed tobe light on their feet, agileand small; nobody wantedto bulk up.

But in the past decade,rodeocowboyshavestartedtaking their diets andwork-outs seriously, Foster said.They’ve started buildingup leanmuscle, enduranceand stability. Now successin the arena is equal partstechnique and fitness level.

“The more fit they are,themore they can ridewiththe technique,” Foster said.“They’remore in control.”

Now,more than 20 yearsinto his career, Mote’s try-ing to improve, not main-tain.

“The only reason I haveto get better is because mycompetition is,” he said.“There’s guys now thatweren’t aroundwhen itwaseasier forme towin. So I’vegot to ride better. They’reobviously younger, but Imean, the level of competi-tion keeps getting better.”

Mote juggles constanttravel — he competes indozens of rodeos each year— with regular workoutsto build up strength, agilityand balance. At any giventime, he’s rehabbing oneinjury or another, and thatcalls for more specific ex-ercises.

“I’ve seen it changequitea bit — the quality of thestock, the quality of theevents, the quality of theriders,” Mote said. “I workway harder at it now than Iever used to.”

7&&8$0 "!&4 ;<$ =;5!;

Mote remembers thefirst time he got on a buck-ing horse as a 15-year-oldinOregon.

“There was a guy whohad an arena about 30min-utes from where I lived,” hesaid. “On Thursday nights,he would buck out horsesand bulls, and you couldpay $8 to get on one.” Motehad a learner’s permit andcouldn’t drive to the arenaby himself, so he talked hisgrandmother into ridingalong in his dad’s truck.

“I didn’t know what toexpect,” he said of that firstride. “It was kind of a blur.Which it was for the firstcouple hundredhorses.”

Eventually, Motedropped out of high schoolto pursue rodeo fulltime.He married in 1999, andfor a long time the youngcouple put all their moneyinto rodeo entry fees. KateMote worked two jobs and

Continued from page 1B helped him chop firewoodto earn a living. Everyweek,they’dpooltheirmoneyandhe’d go to the rodeo. “And Iwouldn’twin,” he said.He’dcome back empty-handed,and onMonday they’d startearning rodeo money allover again.

“It was that way for a fewyears,” Mote said. “And, inbetween, there Iwasgettinghurt all the time, sonot onlydid I have rodeo bills, I hadhospital bills.”

Mote has broken somany ribs, he doesn’t keepcount. He’s had a rod andthree screws in his right legsince a high school rodeo.He broke his collarbone atRodeoHouston, his left footin San Antonio. He oncebroke two vertebrae in hisback when a horse crushedhiminthechute.Hestill fin-ished the year as the worldchampion runner-up.

Earlyinhiscareer,ahorsetossedMote into the side ofan arena. “I hit my headon a post, which knockedme out, and I guess that’swhat fracturedmy skull,” hesaid. “I guess I was in ICUfor three days. I still don’tremember it.”

WhenMote finally beganto win, he won big. He wona couple of big rodeos in2000 andwas reserveworldchampion—the runner-up— the next year. In 2002, atage 26, Mote won his firstworld championship. He’sdone that threemore times,in 2007, 2009 and 2010.Only two bareback ridershave ever won more thanfour titles. Andeven thoughhe’s approaching 40, he’snot about to stop chasingthat fifth gold buckle.

It’s unusual for a bare-back rider to last so long,said Joe Bruce Hancock,general manager of theHouston Livestock ShowandRodeo.

“I liken it to (the career)of a prizefighter,” he said.“Youdon’t seea lotofprize-fighters in their 30s any-more. The wear and tearand the blows to all parts ofyour body, your head andeverywhere else — it’s justdifficult, it really is.”

That goes for all roughstock events, Hancock said,but it’s especially true forbareback riders.

“There’s no stability forthem,”hesaid. “They’re justtiedonby ahandanddoingthe best they can to stay inrhythmwith the animal.”

-&; !$50( ;& #9:;

More than one doctorhas told Mote he shouldwrap up his rodeo career,that he’s too hurt to getbackout there anddomoredamage to his body.

“That news is never easyto take,” he said. “But then,oncetheshockhasworeoff,I guess I always went andgot a second opinion or athird opinion until I foundsomebody who was willingto tell me something differ-ent. I just keep asking until

someone says, ‘No, I thinkwe can do something foryou.’ ”

That’s what happenedwith his neck, which de-veloped bone spurs fromyears of repeated whip-lash. In 2010, the bonespurs started pressing ona nerve and making hisleft arm go numb. Thefirst doctor, Mote recalls,told him, “I’ve reviewedyourMRI, and thebottomline is you’ve had a goodcareer. What do you haveleft to prove? Why don’tyou just hang it up?”

That didn’t sit well witha guy who’d been chas-ing a rodeo dream for 20years. Riding barebackwas all he’d wanted to dosince he was a kid lis-tening to Chris LeDouxsongs.

So he got an appoint-ment with the spine con-sultant to theDallas Cow-boys, who said, “I thinkwe can fix you.” Four dayslater, Mote was havingspinal surgery. Later thatyear, he won his fourthworld championship.

That was the win that“meant the most,” KateMote said. “He had gonethrough somany injuries.Doctors had said, ‘Well,you’re done, let’s call it agood career.’ And then hewins another one.”

That’s why she hasn’tonce tried to talk her hus-band into listening to thedoctors, maybe consideranother line ofwork.

“I always am behindhim,” she said. “He justsays that nobody’s goingto tell him when (to quit)—he’s going tobe theoneto decide. He’s just nottaking no for an answer,so neither am I.”

But then, Kate Mote’sa barrel racer. She under-stands how it is.

“I’ve had a few injuriesmyself,” she said, includ-ing a broken leg and abroken collarbone fromhorses that fell while shewas riding. That hasn’tstopped her from com-

peting whenever she hasthe chance.

*($= &2 52&;<$! %!:'$

To be a bareback rideras long as Mote has re-quires some grit, somedetermination and somelistening to your body.

“A lot of injuries kindof creep up on you,” hesaid. “Wear and tear.Pretty soon, this doesn’tmove right or work right.”When he wakes up in themorning, something usu-ally hurts. “My back …my neck. You just kindatake some Advil at nightbefore you go to bed. Thathelps.”

A few years ago, Motetook up team roping. It’seasier on the body, anevent thatmay let him stayon the rodeo circuit formanymore years. But he’snot planning that transi-tion anytime soon. He stillhas goals. He wants to winanother championship.And he’s putting in thetime, working on strengthand conditioning to avoidmore injury.

Foster, a clinical trainer,has treated a lot of Mote’sinjuriesover theyears, andhe’s seenhow stubbornhecan be about returning tothearena.

“It’s like anything else,”Fostersaid.“Youonlywantto hear what you want tohear.” But Foster doesn’tthink Mote’s even closeto reaching to end of hisbareback riding career.

“He’s still where he canwin,” Foster said. “He isnot there (at the end) yet;hestillhas theability toputanother championship to-gether.”

Mote believes that, too.“If I felt like, ‘Man, that

is it, that is all I can do,’then youwouldn’t seemearoundanymore,”hesaid.“But I don’t feel like that’sthe case.”

Alyson.Ward@Chron.com

Josh Huskin/Houston Chronicle

Bobby Moteworks to finetune his gearbefore thesemi-finals ofthe barebackriding com-petition Feb.21 at theSan AntonioRodeo at theAT&T Centerin San Anto-nio.

./+ .*-) Final seasonwill air in two halvesThat’s pretty overwhelm-ing,” said Weiner in a tele-phone interviewTuesday.

In a calculated move byAMC, the final season of“Mad Men” will be splitinto halves: seven episodesto air this spring, followedby sevenmore in 2015. Thefirst batch of episodes havealready been filmed, andproduction is set to beginon the back half of the sea-son later thismonth.

Although Weiner said itwas not his idea to dividetheseason in two,he“reallydidn’t fight” the networkon it because he had seenhow well this approachworked for the final seasonof “BreakingBad,” and sim-ply accepted it as a writingchallenge.

“The interesting thingis the show is always kindof structured in halves,whether the audience no-tices or not,” he said, not-ing the tendency for ma-jor plot points to emergearound the halfway pointof a given season — thinkthe lawn mower incidentin Season 3, or last year’smerger between SterlingCooper Draper Pryce andrival agency Cutler, Glea-son&Chaough.

The last season of “MadMen” was set in 1968, withthe tumultuous events ofthat infamous year drivingthe show’s narrative in away they hadn’t since theassassination of JFK nearthe end of Season 3. Inone episode, for instance,an advertising awards ban-quet was interrupted bynews ofMartin Luther KingJr.’s assassination.

This upheaval was re-flected in the life of theseries’ protagonist, who byseason’s end found himselfat his lowest point ever:alienated from his wife,Megan, suspended in-definitely from his job andcaught (literally) with hispants down by his teenagedaughter, Sally.

“It was a catastrophicyear for the United Statesand for Don Draper aswell,” says Weiner, whosefilm “You Are Here,” star-ringAmyPoehler andZachGalifianakis, is slated for re-lease this summer. Thoughsome fans, sick of Don’sselfishness and woman-izing, turned on him lastseason, just as many wereencouraged by the closingsceneof the finale, inwhichthe protagonist revealedhis true identity to his threechildren.

But just because Don

came clean to his family— and appears to have rec-onciled with his businesspartners, judging by thepublicity images releasedby AMC — doesn’t meanthat he has completelyturned over a new leaf, saidWeiner. “I definitely thinkthat affected him, but thereare a lot of other conse-quences that are hangingin the balance. You can sayhe’s a survivor, he’s goingto start over, but what doesthatmean?”

Though Weiner did notdisclose an exact start datefor Season 7, he is will-ing to confirm that by theend of the final, 14-episodeseason, “Mad Men” willhave reached the conclu-sion of the ‘60s, meaningthe final season will takeplace in 1969 — anotheryear marked by era-defin-ing events including theApollo 11 moon landing,Woodstock and theTate-LaBianca murders. It’s a neatway towrapupaseries that,on one level, has alwaysbeen about the country’sprecipitous transforma-tion from the conformity ofthe Eisenhower era to thechaos and discord of theVietnamage.

“That was the intentionfor the show all along,” hesaid.

Weinerpromises theplotof the new season will be“extremely dense,” at leastby “Mad Men” standards,and will be focused on theseries’ central characters.As usual, the infamouslysecretive show runner pro-vides few specifics, speak-ing in broad terms aboutthe season ahead.

“I wanted to investigatethe consequences of ac-tions and how they stickwith you, which is kind ofa great topic for the endof the show. I also wantedto talk about the materialworld and the immaterialworld,” he said. “The showhas always been either anexploration of what’s go-ing on inside of Don or ofhowDon is interactingwiththe world. This season I’vereally tried to incorporateboth of them.”

If that sounds like an aw-ful lot ofmaterial to explorein just 14 episodes, Weinerpromises the final seasonis indeed “ambitious.” “ButI believe in risk and I’m notjust going to limp out withDon in aNehru jacket.”

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