Rope Myers, Steer Wrestler

Rope Myers will take a break from wrestling steers Sunday morning and lead a Christian fellowship for the cowboys who are entered at the Texas Stampede.

This Cowboy Church will take place in the Hyatt Regency Hotel. Quite a bit different scene from the places he preached earlier this month when he went on a mission to Uganda in Africa.

"The trip was incredible," he said. "The country has intense poverty, but it's amazing to see the work God's doing over there. The people over there are hungry, in more ways than one. If they are hungry like that, and you bring them the truth, it's amazing how they get ahold of it."

Myers, who is from Van, Texas, said his group visited with 6,000 to 7,000 children at various schools during the three weeks they were there and then had another large number visit their crusades at night.

He said the language barrier presented some problems. "They speak English, but they have trouble understanding us," he said. "So we had translators with us most of the time."

"The neat thing for me was that God became more real to me," said Myers, 32, of his trip. "You would minister to someone almost all of the time, and that constant contact with God would strengthen my faith."

The mission, sponsored by Athletes of Christian Ministry, was Myers' first, but he says for the next one he would like to take his wife and two children. "It was just too long to be away from them."

Myers qualified for this year's Finale despite a limited schedule and will move into Sunday's semi-finals. He has wrestled four steers in 26.10 seconds.

He's cut back his rodeo travels after winning the world steer wrestling title last year, so he could devote more time to his family and pursue his passion - talking about his Christian beliefs to others or, as he calls it, "spreading the good news."

"I've been blessed in my life," he said. "The more you receive, the more you want to give it to others."

He says he still plans to rodeo some, but not nearly as hard as he used to. "The new rule will really help me. I'll probably go to most of the tour rodeos and try to make the Finales," he said. "And who know, maybe even the National Finals Rodeo."

The PRCA has cut the number of rodeos for NFR qualification from 100 to 50 for the timed-event contestants next year.

He says he was blessed for his whole championship run last year. He came into the Texas Stampede 24th, with little hope of making the NFR, which takes the top 15.

But he ended up winning $12,000 here, which moved him to the 13th spot. Once at the NFR, he took care of the opportunities that were presented him.

En route to the championship, he place in nine of 10 rounds, shattering the steer wrestling makr for the 10-head average (37.4), breaking the old mark by 4.6 seconds. He also set a record for money won at the Finals ($117,774) and money won in a season ($176,584).

"I had some tough times during the season," he said. "But all the way through the season, I knew when I left for rodeos, God told me to go. A lot of times, it didn't look good. It didn't look like I was even going to make the Finals. Every time that happened, God was so faithful to run somebody across my path who would reconfirm that it me."

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