Confidence
Trio of riders look to a legend for a means to success
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PUEBLO, Colo. (April 14, 2008) - He’s small, he’s quick, and he’s able to ride just about any type of bull.
More importantly, after an impressive win in Omaha this weekend, Brian Canter is one heck of a confident cowboy.
It’s the first time since opening the season in Duluth, Ga., that he was able to cover all three bulls in one weekend. The first time since two months ago in Anaheim that Canter rode more than one bull in the same weekend.
“We've been out there at the Gary Leffew school,” said Canter, of the trip he made to California with Luke Snyder and Matt Bohon. “We've just been…getting on bulls and getting some confidence back.”
Instead of going home after Nampa, the three riders went to Northern California to work with Leffew before heading to Kansas City for the grand opening of the PBR Big Sky bar, and then on to Omaha.
Leffew, known as a bull riding guru, worked with all three of the riders this past week and stressed not only physical techniques, but also the importance of attitude.
“I’ve been thinking about some stuff too much,” Canter admitted. “Shoot, I just let it all hang out this weekend and just do what I do.”
What he was able to do was pretty impressive.
Needing only an 82.50 in the short go, he followed up two solid rides – an 87.75 in Round 1 and an 87.25 in Round 2 – with a season-best 92.50 to easily defeat Austin Meier for the event win.
Canter, currently ranked 18th in the world and still more than 4,000 points behind Guilherme Marchi, has competed in 14 of the 16 events in 2008. Going into the weekend had covered only 15 of 34 bulls this season and one of his last six.
Bohon, who traveled with Canter to visit with Leffew, was not as fortunate.
The Missouri native is in a terrible slump, to say the least, having bucked off 18 times in his last 20 outs. He has covered only 12 of his 39 bulls this season – 7 percentage points under his career average.
“For Matt Bohon,” said TV commentator Craig Hummer, “it just keeps getting worse.”
He’s made the short go only three times this season and had but one Top 10 finish – Winston-Salem – in a season he’d just as soon be done with. But he’s still fighting to turn things around - the way Snyder has in the past four weeks.
After a relatively inconsistent start to 2008, Snyder has earned three Top 10 finishes in the past four weeks, including an event win in Nampa.
Although he admits he didn’t ride as many practice bulls as Canter and Bohon, he said that Leffew did analyze some video tapes and provided him with feedback regarding a few things that could help better his performance.
Snyder made it to the championship round in Omaha despite bucking off in the second round, and wound up finishing ninth overall.
“That’s the first time we’ve seen him stub his toe in recent weeks,” Justin McKee said to a national television audience.
“Yeah,” agreed Michael Gaffney, “and he stubbed his toe on a left-handed spinning bull—he’s been doing extremely well on these bulls going away from his hand.”
Having reclaimed their confidence, hopefully Canter and Snyder will continue their winning ways and, more importantly, their good friend Bohon will be able to recapture his form of a year ago when he finished 7th in the world.
After all, as Leffew stresses to all his students, mental success comes with confidence.
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