Liberty Cunningham, a 14-year-old trick rider from Kansas who will perform during the Thursday and Friday Lincoln County Fair PRCA rodeos, stepped into the SVI Radio studio to chat about her performances.

(0:00) I taught my mom for lessons for five years and she caved when I was eight and so I’ve (0:05) been trick riding for six years now and I started Roman riding when I was 10. (0:10) Okay, so if you remember as a toddler, why? (0:15) I mean what was it about trick riding that really caught your attention? (0:17) So I saw trick riders at like, I think I was at a rodeo with my sister because we went (0:22) every year for her and I saw their sparkles and they had really pretty costumes on and (0:28) really pretty horses and I was like, mom, I want to do that and so every time someone (0:33) asked me like, what do you want to be when you grow up? (0:36) I would say a trick rider and I guess I didn’t have to grow up for it to happen. (0:40) So you’ve been doing this officially since you were eight now.
(0:43) Yes. (0:44) So tell us what you do. (0:46) I mean you have two horses or more horses it looks like.
(0:49) Tell us about that. (0:50) So I actually have four that I travel with and they all look the same but I do have four. (0:56) Trick riding is hanging off the side of one running horse or standing up, I guess.
(1:02) And then Roman riding is standing on top of two different horses at once and controlling (1:07) them both and I don’t tie my Roman team together. (1:09) So that’s cool. (1:10) They’re kind of just like fighting me.
(1:12) So they can go whatever way they want. (1:14) Yeah, it’s a lot of brains working. (1:17) And then I also do some liberty work, which is the horse working like with no tack on.
(1:23) She’s just completely free and she knows some tricks like a dog. (1:27) How did you train for this? (1:29) Obviously it took hours and I can’t even imagine how many hours behind the scenes to prepare (1:33) to do what you’re going to do tonight. (1:36) Did you have someone special come in and train and coach you for this? (1:40) So actually I haven’t had a coach in a little over almost a year pretty much because I’ve (1:47) been traveling so much that it’s mostly just instead of training at home, it’s like my (1:52) training is a show and then I go to another show and then another show.
(1:57) My big training time is in the winter because I don’t, well, it’s less busy. (2:02) And then throughout the year I try to go to like clinics because I like to learn from (2:08) multiple people because everyone has a different way of doing something. (2:11) So it’s just, I don’t really have one specific coach.
(2:15) No, that’s that. (2:16) That makes sense. (2:16) And you mentioned obviously you travel a lot in the summer.
(2:19) Do you know, just a guess, how many rodeos you might do in a month during the rodeo season (2:26) in the summertime? (2:29) Well, that’s, well. (2:31) Are you doing like three or four a week? (2:33) Is it that many or not quite so many? (2:35) It’s not quite that many. (2:36) It also depends on how many performances the rodeo has.
(2:40) So like for example, this trip I’m on, I’m going to be gone for 20 days and I think it’s (2:45) like three different rodeos, but one of them is like a week long. (2:49) I perform every day for a week. (2:51) This one is two days.
(2:52) Another one is like two days. (2:54) So it kind of just depends on the rodeo I could say because it also, some rodeos are (3:00) just even one day and another rodeo is multiple days at once. (3:05) Now we mentioned you’re only 14.
(3:07) You mentioned yourself, you didn’t have to wait to grow up to do this. (3:09) You just started it right away. (3:11) What is the end goal? (3:12) What’s the big dream for this, for you? (3:15) What would you like it to become? (3:17) Well, I would like to trick ride hopefully someday at the National Finals Rodeo or the (3:21) NFR.
(3:22) And I just want to trick ride for as long as I don’t like paralyze myself because trick (3:30) riding is very hard on the body. (3:34) And like my sister, she is a competitor in rodeo. (3:37) She’s a goat tire and she has like no knees.
(3:41) So trick riding and road riding is definitely very hard. (3:44) So I just want to do it for as long as my body can. (3:48) Gotcha.
(3:48) And fantastic. (3:49) Well, we can’t wait to see it tonight. (3:51) It’s going to be tonight and tomorrow night.
(3:53) Tickets available to see Liberty and all the performers at the rodeo competitors available (3:58) at LincolnCountyFair.info. (4:01) Liberty, if you could just leave one message with our listeners this morning on why they (4:06) should come to the rodeos to see you and the other contestants perform. (4:10) I mean, what are they going to get out of coming tonight to see you perform? (4:13) You are going to be sitting on the edge of your seats. (4:16) You’re going to see me with my head in the dirt on a running horse.
(4:21) I’m basically like trying not to die, but like professionally. (4:26) So you’re going to have a lot of fun. (4:29) And I think you should really just come out because all the competitors are great and (4:33) you’re going to have just tons of fun.
(4:36) From Kansas, 14-year-old Liberty Cunningham, a trick rider, she’s at the Lincoln County (4:41) Fair PRCA rodeos tonight and tomorrow night. (4:44) Liberty, thank you. (4:45) Thank you.
(4:45) And we can’t wait to see it all happen. (4:47) Yep. (4:48) It’s all part of the weekday wakeup this morning on the SVI Radio Network.