Following is a look into the life of Cody Lambert, vice president of the Professional Bull Riders and the organization’s livestock director. The timeline starts in Anaheim, Calif., site of the PBR’s Amp’d Mobile Invitational Built Ford Tough event.
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SUNDAY (FEB. 11)
5 p.m. (Pacific Standard Time) Cody Lambert goes back by his hotel in Anaheim, Calif. for a shower after working at the bull riding.
8:55 p.m. (PST) The plane he’s on takes off from John Wayne Airport in Orange County, Calif. He has layovers in Las Vegas and Dallas.
MONDAY (FEB. 12)
8:30 a.m. (Central Standard Time) Lambert arrives at Will Rogers World Airport in Oklahoma City.
10 a.m. He arrives by rental car at the Lazy E Arena near Guthrie.
3:15 p.m. “I started the day a little grumpy, but it’s getting better,” he said while scoring the efforts of bulls during the Express Open at the Lazy E Arena near Guthrie.
3:59 p.m. “You’re seeing three competitions at once. There are 101 bulls that have entered at $1,200 each in the American Bucking Bull Incorporated competition. These are 3- to 4-year-old bulls, and the top bull will win $20,000. Also the bullfighters are working in teams of two and are judged on their protection skills. There are 10 of those teams, and each team has a sponsor. Then obviously you have the bull riders who are competing, and there are 223 cowboys entered just here at the Lazy E. Every aspect of those three helps the industry at every level. In a lot of ways, it’s like a farm system, but you get the opportunity to advance so much faster. A lot of the bulls we’re watching today will be the bulls you’ll see on TV next year. And we’ll see some of these bull riders on TV by the end of this year.”
4:13 p.m. “There’s a bull I want to take a look at that could be worth a lot of money.” The bull has a below-average showing. “That’s not what I expected from what I’d heard, but it happens to me too. I’ll say one is going to really buck and sometimes it won’t.”
5 p.m. Goes to dinner.
6:41 p.m. While sitting in the rodeo office at the Lazy E, Lambert is "checking the re-rides to make sure they’re what I want."
7:03 p.m. “I’m running on fumes.”
7:40 p.m. The first bull in Monday’s second round springs from the bucking chute.
9:05 p.m. Lambert is standing in the arena along the chutes as Clayton Williams, a cowboy from Carthage, Texas, who rides with his right hand, records an 87-point effort on a bull that spun to the right.
9:28 p.m. The last bull of the night tosses its rider, and Lambert starts walking toward the rodeo office.
9:35 p.m. “I’m going over the bulls I want to bring back on Wednesday and I’m setting my re-ride bulls.” Judges are allowed to award a bull rider a re-ride — a second ride on a different bull — if they feel his first bull did not perform at the level of other bulls in the competition, and therefore did not give him a fair chance to earn a high score.
9:40 p.m. “I slept about 20 minutes on one of those flights. It’s just like when I was rodeoing, except I’m a lot older, and back then, I wouldn’t have said anything about being up all night.”
9:45 p.m. He finishes deciding which bulls he’ll use for re-rides.
10:09 p.m. Lambert reads the list of the re-ride bulls to the rodeo secretary, who enters them in the computer.
10:15 p.m. “Going long hours like this isn’t uncommon for a lot of other people on our PBR staff.” Lambert then walks out of the Lazy E Arena to his rental car and then it’s on to his hotel in Oklahoma City. He has to be back at the Lazy E at 8:30 a.m. Tuesday.
TUESDAY (FEB. 13)
11: 46 a.m. Lambert has been at the Lazy E much of the morning, but things are getting real busy as the start of the second day of competition nears. “That’s a short go bull for Wednesday night,” he says while looking at scores and talking to a stock contractor. “And there’s another one.”
11:51 a.m. His cell phone rings for about the second time in 90 seconds. That’s not uncommon.
12:41 p.m. We get to talking about how sometimes the bull rope will become wrapped around a bull rider’s leg when he’s coming off the animal. Lambert explained that one thing he’s taught at bull riding schools is that the cowboy should roll the rope up loose when packing it in the bag. “If you roll it up tight, then when you use it, you’ll see it curl at the end, and that can wrap around the guy’s leg. But if you wrap it loose, you’ll usually just see it roll out there pretty flat.”
1:58 p.m. While watching the bull riding action, Lambert mentions that he’ll receive two to 10 videos a week of bucking bulls from stock contractors. They might have one bull or 20 bulls on the video. “I like it when they compile video of the bull bucking at home, at an indoor arena and at an outdoor arena. If the bull is good in all those situations he probably won’t be distracted when we take him under the bright lights.”
4:26 p.m. Lambert is back in the office going over scores of the bulls. Then it’s off to dinner.
7:46 p.m. The first bull of the second round evening performance bursts out of the chute.
9:32 p.m. The second round ends, and Lambert heads to the rodeo office. “Now I get to get busy,” he said referring to picking bulls for Wednesday’s action. “This will probably take an hour or to two hours.”
WEDNESDAY (FEB. 14)
1 a.m. Lambert gets back to his hotel room in Oklahoma City after finishing up with his work at the Lazy E.
9 a.m. He arrives back at the Lazy E Arena to double-check the list of bulls for Wednesday night and he gives a list of re-ride bulls to the rodeo secretary.
12:46 p.m. Lambert and wife Leanne get in the car to drive to Portales, N.M., to watch son Riley Lambert play basketball Wednesday night for Abilene (Texas) Christian University against Eastern New Mexico University. He’ll return for Friday’s PBR action at the Ford Center in Oklahoma City.
