Rodeo de Santa Fe: Wrangling spirits

Hobbs trio finds comfort, inspiration in shared love of rodeo

James Barron | The New Mexican

6/26/2008 - 6/27/08

The city of Hobbs will have its identity attached to basketball forever, but that attachment doesn't include brothers Miles and Cimarron Thompson or Tommy Smith.

They hail from Hobbs, but their sport of choice involves roping calves and riding bulls.

Traveling the rodeo circuit is just as much a tradition to the Thompsons and Smith as state titles are to their hometown, though. They were raised on it as kids, and they haven't strayed far from it.

"Whenever you get a little time away from it, you find yourself reminiscing about the good times you had out there," said Cimarron Thompson, the younger brother and neighbor of Smith, the grizzled mentor with 25 years of competition behind him.

The trio often ride together from event to event, although Miles Thompson didn't follow his brother and Smith to Pecos, Texas, for its rodeo Thursday morning. He was in Santa Fe on Wednesday for the bareback riding event, but showed off his talent in the tie-down roping competition on Thursday at the 59th annual Rodeo de Santa Fe, collaring and tying up his calf in an event-best 9.1 seconds, in front of his brother and Smith.

It was 1.6 seconds faster than Smith, who had the third-best time. Cimarron Thompson didn't fare as well, as he failed to rope his calf and record a time. All three will ride again in stage competition this morning to complete their two runs in the tie-down roping.

For Smith, who says he's in his last year of competition, he finds the brothers' company on the road cathartic.

"With these young boys around, they keep you feeling young," Smith said. "The relationship's still the same, though. I remember him (Cimarron Thompson) when he was a baby, 2 or 3 years old. Shoot, I guess if you hang around long enough, they grow up on you and here they are."

Miles Thompson says Smith is invaluable when it comes to his experience touring the circuit, knowing the ins and outs of the business.

"For green guys it's a very important thing, if you got somebody who knows how to enter and where to go, which guys to compete against and which rodeos to go to," Miles Thompson said.

Right now, the Thompsons' confidence is brimming. Cimarron Thompson, who is only 21 and in his first year of professional competition, already has an event win — in steer wrestling at the Big Springs (Texas) Rodeo — and Miles Thompson might be in position for his breakthrough if another solid run follows his initial effort.

Still, nothing beats the time they have together, regardless of who's winning.

"We get to go together, help each other out, respect each other," Cimarron Thompson says. "You always have somebody in your corner, no matter what."

Contact James Barron at 986-3045 or jbarron@sfnewmexican.com