DONE Rodeos Cowboys Okalahoma

The spirit of the old American West can still be found at rodeos. Modern-day cowboys compete to stay on wild, jumping horses, or struggle to ride bulls that weigh up to a

ton. Cowgirls also compete in rodeos.

Rodeos used to be found mainly in small towns out in the country. But today Americans in big cities also get the chance to shout "ride 'em, cowboy!"

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The first major open-air rodeo of the season is called La Fiesta（假日）de los Vaqueros -- Spanish for the Celebration of the Cowboys. And the cowboys will be celebrating February eighteenth to the twenty-sixth（18-26）in Tucson, Arizona.

Current and former world champions of the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association will take part. In all, about seven hundred competitors will demonstrate their skills.

And if that is not enough, there is also the Tucson Rodeo Parade on February

twenty-third. Organizers call it "the world's longest non-motorized parade." Who needs a motor when four legs and a horse will do?

La Fiesta de los Vaqueros is one of hundreds of professional rodeos in the United States.

Rodeos have long been a tradition in the West. But the sport is also popular in major cities in the Midwest like Chicago, Illinois, and Minneapolis, Minnesota. In fact, rodeos can be found from coast to coast. Georgia and North Carolina are two Eastern states with rodeo programs for high school students.

Some rodeos are held in big sports centers. And some are shown on television. A rodeo might also have related events. In December, the Minneapolis Invitational held parties to celebrate the New Year.

Rodeos have gone from small, local events to big business. For example, the National Western Stock Show and Rodeo took place in January in Denver, Colorado. It gave away five hundred thousand dollar s in prize money.

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American rodeos developed long ago from the skills that cowboys needed to work with cattle in the West.

Cowboys had to know how to train wild horses. They had to be excellent riders. And they had to know how to use a rope to catch and tie a runaway cow.

By eighteen fifty, cowboys were competing in roping and riding in New Mexico. But Pecos, Texas, is called the "Home of the World's First Rodeo." The event was held in eighteen eighty-three. It took place on July fourth, America's birthday. Other early rodeos took place in Wyoming, Colorado and Arizona.

In nineteen twelve, some wealthy businessmen in Canada agreed to pay for a rodeo in the town of Calgary, in Alberta Province. That rodeo was called the Calgary Stampede. If offered cowboys prize money up to a thousand dollars.

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Today, rodeos include events like bull riding, calf（小牛）and steer（闫牛）roping, steer wrestling, saddle bronc（野马）r iding and bareback（无马鞍）bronc riding.

Bronc is short for bronco. A bronco is a wild horse, or a horse that still acts like one. A steer is a young male cow that has been neutered（阉牛）

Steer wrestling and bareback bronc riding developed as rodeo sports in the twentieth century.