Dropping the job to follow a dream: Aldridge becomes surprise contender for championship

It was the great golfer Lee Trevino who famously said: You don’t know what pressure is until you play for $5 a hole, with only $2 in your pocket.

Tricia Aldridge, who won her second go-round of the Wrangler National Finals Rodeo on Thursday to become a surprise contender for the barrel racing championship, can relate to that.

The itinerant Texas cowgirl doesn’t come from privilege or money. So when she decided to see how far her love of horses would take her in a long-shot bid to qualify for the NFR, sacrifices were made.

She walked away from her job as a civil engineer. Time is another resource a rodeo hopeful must wisely manage in pursuing a lifelong dream. Punching a time clock simply doesn’t leave enough time for it.

Aldridge gave herself two years to make it to Las Vegas.

It only took her one.

Aldridge and her 5-year-old stallion Adios Pantalones — so named for a craft beer with a similar stoutness — are putting a frothy flourish on the NFR, continuing to confound the experts.

By grinding out $141,182 in 87 rodeos during the regular season, Aldridge comfortably qualified for pro rodeo’s Super Bowl in 11th position among 15 finalists.

But as the NFR sprints toward its conclusion, what once seemed the stuff of fantasy is turning into a compelling story that just might shatter Cinderella’s glass slipper.

Twice as nice

Aldridge raced to her first go-round win on Sunday night, with a blistering time of 13.42 seconds. She backed that up with a 13.64 Thursday to take another victory lap. And in a hotly contested Wednesday seventh go-round, Aldridge was second in 13.52 seconds.

“I don’t even know what I’m doing,” an incredulous Aldridge said Thursday, after she and her horse cashed for the sixth time in eight trips around the Thomas &Mack Center barrels. The top six each night finish in the money.

“I’m just out there having fun, and I know if my horse Adios is having fun, he will take care of me.”

The rider and her steed, who snacks on Blueberry Pop-Tarts, have earned more than $146,000 in Las Vegas — surpassing her season earnings by nearly $5,000 — with two rounds still to go.

“It’s definitely super hard to get here your first time, and you don’t really know what to expect,” Aldridge said about having vaulted from 11th to third in the world standings with $287,800.

“He’s beaten all those horses before, so I knew that he was capable. But when you get here, it’s so loud and it’s so many nights in a row — there’s just so many things you can’t factor in.”

The same goes for the rider. Aldridge said her prior experience before committing to a full rookie season consisted of no more than 10 rodeos.

Unlike superstar cowboy Stetson Wright, whose family tree includes nine saddle bronc champions spanning three generations, there usually was no place for Aldridge to turn when she needed advice.

There was no blueprint for her to follow. Not even a cocktail napkin with the address of a Motel 6 scrawled on it, when she was hauling her horse to make it to the next rodeo, with her eyes getting bleary.

“I was the kid begging for a pony,” she said about her only credential before setting out to take the Women’s Professional Rodeo Association by storm.

Adiós muchachas

Aldridge said she anticipated making a lot of rookie mistakes, and she did. But every time she lost her way, the horse with legs like pistons — which she purchased as a weanling — quickly got her back on the right path.

“This week is a grueling week for any horse,” said Aldridge, who refers to Adios Pantalones (translation: Goodbye Pants) as her teammate. “But I think he has gotten stronger all week. He really loves his job.”

Except for toppling a barrel in Round 6 to incur a 5-second penalty, which temporarily knocked Aldridge out of the hunt for the NFR average title, Aldridge and Adios have kept it clean since arriving in the desert.

Aldridge has since bounced back to fourth in the aggregate, which pays $94,035 to win.

After eight rounds, she trailed reigning champion Kassie Mowry by 5.2 seconds in the average and about $60,000 in the world championship standings.

Hailey Kinsel was second in the world standings at $308,096, but only sixth in the average, nearly 5 seconds behind Aldridge.

With the gaps continuing to narrow, Aldridge’s legions of loyal social media followers started raving about her chances to be fitted for the glass slipper.

As one wrote in summarizing her meteoric rise to prominence: “Buy your own horse, raise it, train it, promote it, win on it, build a business, market a supplement company, be a social media icon, make it to the NFR on the most successful 5-year-old stallion in the world and set an arena record. You’re amazing.”

I think what she was trying to say is that Tricia Aldridge is no longer playing for $5 with only $2 in her pocket.