Weiser’s Shelbie Allen to compete for CSI rodeo team

By: 
Steve Lyon

Weiser High School senior and all-around cowgirl Shelbie Allen will be enrolling at the College of Southern Idaho in the fall and joining the school’s rodeo team.
 Allen chose CSI after doing research on the rodeo program and the team’s standings this year. She visited the Twin Falls campus in January and met with coach Steve Birnie. She will be one of five women on the team.
 “I’m impressed by how he runs the program, and I like the facilities. I’m excited,” she said.
 CSI is a member of the National Intercollegiate Rodeo Association and competes in the Rocky Mountain Region against a dozen other colleges in Idaho, Utah and Colorado, including Idaho State University, Utah State University, Weber State University and other schools.
 The CSI rodeo team has been a force to be reckoned with in the Rocky Mountain Region and in the nation over the past few years. The CSI men’s and women’s team recently placed first and sixth at the Colorado Mesa University Rodeo and clinched berths in the College National Finals Rodeo coming up in June.
 Allen plans to major in business management at CSI, a two-year school. She hopes to do well enough in competition in her first year at CSI to make it to the College National Finals Rodeo. The goal is to earn a trip to the college finals and get recruited by a four-year university with a rodeo program so she can complete a bachelor’s degree.
 She has her eyes on another big prize after college that will require her to hit the road on the rodeo circuit. She wants to compete as a pro in rodeos, a full-time job in itself, she said.
 Allen has competed all four years of high school in the District 2 Idaho High School Rodeo Association. Prior to that, she competed in the junior high rodeo program. She made the national junior high rodeo finals in goat tying in 2014.
 She is an all-around rodeo competitor in barrel racing, breakaway roping, team roping and goat tying. Pole bending has been her best rodeo sport the past couple of years in high school.
 “I’m kind of good at all of them,” she said.
 Allen has qualified at the district level to compete at the state high school rodeo finals every year. She was the 2017 state champion in pole bending and the runner-up in 2018.
 The top four placers in each event at state qualify for the big show, the National High School Finals Rodeo held in Wyoming every July. She qualified for the national finals  as a freshman, sophomore and junior in pole bending with her horse Leon, a bay roan gelding. Her best finish at nationals was a respectable 12th place.
 It takes speed and horse agility to win in pole bending. The rider must weave between six poles placed in a straight line and spaced 21 feet apart. The rider turns around and weaves back through the poles and then dashes to the finish. There is a five-second penalty for each pole knocked over.
 It’s a rodeo sport that takes lots of practice, Allen said, and she has spent many hours in the arena at home trying to get faster. At CSI, she will compete in all four events open to the women’s team.
 Allen comes from a rodeoing family. She has been riding horses since she was age 3. One of her grandparents was a stock contractor. Her mom, Kassie, competed in barrel racing and her dad, Ted, was a team roper.
 Allen will graduate this month and plans to compete this summer in high school rodeos in her final year of eligibility. She also played basketball on the varsity squad for the Wolverines.
 “I plan to keep working on my skills and be ready to rodeo in the fall,” she said.
 

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18 E. Idaho St.
Weiser, ID 83672
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