<\/p>\n
Missing last Saturday\u2019s graduation at Ignacio High School couldn\u2019t be avoided for Dustin Sanchez.<\/p>\n
While entered in the 2019 Colorado State High School Rodeo Association Finals at the Moffat County Fairgrounds in Craig, the IHS senior not only took part in a special \u201crodeo graduation\u201d Sunday afternoon but the next day took the top prize in his rough-stock specialty of bull riding, and he earned a place in this summer\u2019s nationals, too.<\/p>\n
After posting no score in the first go-round, Sanchez logged an 82-point ride in the second, which stood as the competition\u2019s best overall effort. In the deciding short go, he then received a 70 from the judges, good enough for second place in the go and good enough to earn first in the average with 152 points on two head.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was just sitting on that bull, and he sat against the latch when I called for him,\u201d Sanchez said Thursday, recalling his peak performance which, coming out of the chute, gave no hint it would be such a thing. \u201cHe kind of stalled out before I could get him to go out. It felt like I was out of whack the whole time. But I watched my video; I was riding him just how I should have.\u201d<\/p>\n
Cortez-area entrant Cooper McClain, who won the short go with a 72, took second with 143\/2 figures.<\/p>\n
Having placed second by one point, 74-73, to Walsenburg\u2019s Christopher McKenna on May 11-12 up in Greeley\u2019s Island Grove Regional Park on Day 1 of the last stop before state, Sanchez\u2019s 29 total points in Craig upped his 2018-19 count to a championship-winning 107, while McClain\u2019s 28-point take boosted his to 64\u00bd. Hayden\u2019s Keenan Hayes gained 16 points at the MCFG and increased his year-end haul to a third-place 46.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou know, I was pretty speechless when I won it,\u201d said Sanchez, referring to the CSHSRA State Championship. \u201cI\u2019d worked so hard for stuff and nothing\u2019s panned out the way I wanted it to, so I was like, \u2018Is this even happening to me?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
The 2019 National High School Finals Rodeo is set for July 14-20 at the Sweetwater Events Complex in Rock Springs, Wyoming.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
National High School Finals Rodeo calls bull rider next<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":93739,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5770],"tags":[846,427,937,2343],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-93738","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-high-school-sports","tag-ignacio-high-school","tag-prep-sports","tag-rodeo","tag-sports-group"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93738","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=93738"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93738\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/93739"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93738"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93738"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93738"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=93738"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}