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When most people think of Lane Frost they think of "Eight Seconds" and you definitely
get an idea of Lane Frost from the movie. To be able to go back to Clyde and Elsie Frost's
place and talk about Lane Frost and the true Lane Frost is going to be pretty interesting
to be at the place where Lane grew up, where Lane practiced and what he was really like.
What got you guys into wanting to come to this bull riding school. Lane. Lane..the town
of Lane or...Lane, the movie "Eight Seconds". Lane Frost? And what about you Braden, what
got you to want to come to the school? I wanted to know how to be a bull rider and I came
for also like him Lane Frost. Sweet!
So,have you all seen Lane Frost riding any bulls? Yeah, I've seen some videos of him riding. What about you? Yeah, I have. I seen two.
Did you know that Lane Frost built this arena himself? Yeah. He put on the very first school
right here at this arena. You like the way Mike Lee kind of works on working with the horse and then
the chute procedure, because I've seen you guys out there on the horse earlier and man,
you guys already pretty good I mean you all are already getting the hang of it, is it kind
of a confidence builder for you this week? Yeah. I'm a natural. I heard that you brought
a cup. Tell me what you plan to do with your cup. Plan to get some dough out of the arena
and put in my arena that we're going to build. So you're taking sand out of Lane Frost's
arena and put in your new arena at your house? Yes.
Look up between his ears. Get off your butt like this. Up and down...up and down..there
you go. Like this..up and down...up and down. Turn your legs out. There you go. Turn your
legs out. Up down..up down..up down. Lean forward. There you go. Good. Up down...Up down
...ride..ride..ride..ride..forward. Good job. Turn your legs out. Ride..ride..ride..ride.
up down..up down. Good job buddy. OK, get off. Got to roll!
To tell you the truth, a lot of bull riders they don't make it and they only make it to
a certain point and they're just, they're doing it to have a little bit of fun when
they're young, but for the ones that are going to go on, it is preparing them for a long
career and how to get out of the way and how to, you know you got to have muscle memory
to get off, so if you keep doing it over and over again when it's really hard, you get
off a bull you do it right. At these schools, it's hard because, they're trying to learn
so much so if they get just a little bit, it's a big reward to me, if I see them do
something right, or see them keep trying and ride through and ride out of a...like they
get in trouble and they ride out of a little bit of trouble, that's an encouragement towards
me that I actually did something. You know, but at this school it's they actually get
better after they leave the school because they quit trying so hard, but they get a lot
of tools here you know to use later on. You get your first time never been on a bull,
I've had 50 year old guys come, come to my bull riding school, and they try really hard
and hit the ground like a ton of bricks and then you get kids that have been riding for
seven or eight years that really know how to ride bulls and there ain't a whole lot
you can teach them, but there's this little correctness that you can make that improves
your bull riding and a lot it is encouraging them and telling them it's OK to be..that
fear is OK and to understand that fear and to use it for their advantage, let them be
aggressive, but be aggressive in the right way, not scare the bull but be aggressive
in the right place at the right time.
Toes out in front. Relax. Move up and down.
Get your legs out. Turn your legs out. There you go. Up and down..up and down..up and down. On your legs, you're bouncing on your butt. There you go. Better. Look up between your ears,
ride forward towards your ears. Ride forward towards your ears. Good. Turn your legs out
You're gonna have to sit up and lean back on that a little bit. All right? Get up there. Go to front...Go to front!
Now come out towards me a little, now go around. Good. Good. Let me see your feet. Look at me. I want to see you do this.
Step over the top of your foot.
We've been having this bull fighting school here at Lane, at Clyde and Elsie Frost's,we've been doing it probably, this is probably
our tenth one, I kind of lost track as far excactly how many of them we've done, what
we try to do here is just is break everything down for them. I want them to learn a foundation,
have a foundation built of the basics of what we do, and I've got some of my young guys
that I've taught, they come and help me and we use a dummy, we use a horse, we break down
every situation, just down to that simplest level of just being able to control the bull
and then we just kind of add to it, and everything kind of that foundation, what they learn at
that first level, that next level we just kind of add to it and they learn that next
level and it just kind of keeps building and if we have a problem, something ain't right,
we just go right back to the foundation and fix it and that fixes the problem.
I've got to be aware of his head coming around, OK? And if I know he's going to hit me, I've
got to just kind of stop and try to either get a hold of his head and get things kind
of lined out or I just got to, if he goes by me, I just got to time it because his head's
going to go by and his hips are going to go by, and then I'm just going to time it to
where I can step right here and get in my spot.
We have guys that come in here that have fought bulls for several years and a lot of times
they have to overcome some bad habits and some stuff that they've learned that's not
good and to see them face that and to get it back down on a simpler level.
And then, once they do that, then they start having a lot more success, you know with their bull
fighting because they got it back down to a simpler level and got the basics right.
And then it starts building and you start seeing do good and have success, find what
they've been looking for, you know what I mean, and it's not that I'm against you kind
of deal, it's we're out here together to do a job and we try to teach them that in the
school to work together in everything you do to split up the work, and it makes everything
run good, because if you can ever learn how to work as a team, fighting bulls is a lot
easier, and to just see the guys they can't help it, they can't help but to encourage
each other because they, when they're out there, they're kind of struggling, and they
hear that encouragement and it builds them up. Well they just turn around and give it
right back, and they're just they wan't to help that guy that's right there next to them.
That's kind of the cool part. And that's always been the cool part of rodeo. My career has been
like 21 years now, and a lot of the things they're getting to do in three days, it took
eight, nine years before I got a chance to do them, you know what I mean? Before I figured
out, and had a chance to do it that way and for them to have it that quick and just see
the fun they're having, and how much success they're having, it's really cool.
There you go..that's good! Good. Help your partner now. Help your partner. Now back up.
Just be ready. Because you never know if things ain't right, as you disappear, keep your eyes on...
The dummy is just a simple, it's a simple
tool, and what it does is allow us to break down and simulate the movement of a bull,
simulate each situation, we can control it, we can stop it right there and fix our position,
show them the correct way to approach it. It's also you can kind of take away that fear
a little bit, that factor of that bull and let him just relax and actually get the movement
down and lot's of repetitions of it to where their muscles start remembering and you get
that muscle memory and to me that's the most important thing about the dummy is just being
able to slow things down where it's more relaxed and they can do things correctly and then
a lot of repetition, and then that muscle memory when you put the bulls in there, you
start seeing a lot of that. You see that correct movement. And that helps them have more success
and with the horses when we work on the hangup, is just a lot of times the hangup is just
a matter finding that sweet spot on that bull to where he can't kick you or hook you as
easy or step on you and that horse is just a good simulation of where whenever they move
in on one, to find that spot and to get in time with his animal and get in the right
position to where they can work a hangup. And again, we can slow it down, the horse
ain't near as intense as a bull so they can relax a little better and have a chance to
learn the correct way before we put them in on the situation with all the adrenaline.
Well, when Lane got back from the National Finals in '85, he'd won a pretty good bunch
of money and he come in and ask me if he can build an arena over to have his bull riding
school. You know it's some place to have one and it's not very good. About that time the
phone rung, and it was Floyd Hogan and said you don't know anybody that needs a load of
pipe do you? Well, I don't know, here talk to Lane, and about thirty minutes they was
unloading that pipe.
Being here at this bull riding school today, I can remember Lane telling me that he was going to look at some working pens somewhere,
he said we're fixing to build some working pens. I said, Oh we are? He said, yeah I'm
going to look at some. So he wanted to incorporate a bull riding arena with some working pens
and this is one of the best facilities that I know of, but it all started right here.
And there's been a lot of young cowboys get their start here in the bull fighting and also
the bull riding career.
I knew he was wanting to ride bulls from the time he could talk,said I'm the world's champion. Robin was always complaining about how she was having to feed
more calves, they'd feed the dirty calves. I went by there one day and there was a shed
and I was walking here and there was a pen out here in front. Well he had an old panel
he tied up and put in the corner there and pushed one of them dairy calves in there and
bind and twine on it and got on there and we're kicking he pushed the gate out of the
way. I had a dog that worked pretty good and I sucked him on it and he'd bucked him off.
He got off and looked around and said that's fun, let's do that again. So I built him a
little bucking chute, and I told Elsie we aren't trying to ignore, we just as well help
him. He's going to do it with us or without it. And I believe that you know. He couldn't
have done it early as he did. He loved it I'll tell you.
Well, no matter where I was, one time he told Elsie, I never did brag on him I tell what
I thought he done wrong and one time he told Elsie, he said, No matter how good I ride,
I can't please Dad, she told him what the deal was. Well then, it wasn't too long until
if I was into bull riding, as soon as he got off, here he come. I left Dakota I think it
was and there was a redheaded preacher from Antlers had a bull in the bull riding and
Lane was the last bull rider out, and I just walked back out to the pickup and was standing
there and he walked up and he said he made a great fight, and I said you liked to messed
it up. I can't believe he won the bull ride, so here comes Lane, he said you sure made
a good run, and he said yeah but I liked to screwed it up. I don't remember what he done,
but he done something. He weathered it. God used Lane then and made him the way he was,
and everybody liked him, and they're still using him. It's unbelievable. Little kids,
we hear from them all the time. A lot them names Lane.
I met Lane at the high school finals when he was, I was out high school but I was going
from a rodeo in Cheyenne to Casper, Wyoming and I stopped at the high school finals.
Tough was there, my little brother was there, and so I stopped to see them and Lane was there,
and he already he had a big following there, there's a lot of high school kids that were
following him around and I just won second in the bronc riding in Cheyenne the day before
and nobody knew who I was and these kids are all following Lane around and I'd heard of
him before, but that was the first time I saw him in person, the first time I met him.
A few years later he caught a ride with me from Las Vegas, I was going to the college
finals we was going to the Las Vegas rodeo and then I was going to the college finals
and he was wanting to go to his uncle's place in Utah, and he caught a ride for a few hundred
miles out of Las Vegas and got out and hitchhiked from like somewhere in Utah trying
to get east to Vernal, Utah where his uncle lived.
Well in Utah, they didn't have many junior rodeos. We moved down here they had bunches
and he found them all out right quick. But at that tiny age, you know I rodeoed with
Clyde most of the time, I mean we had a little trailer, and back then you went to a rodeo
and you was there for several days because Clyde was up in three events a lot of the
times and he might get ahead every day, and then of course in the summertime, he'd get
a little busier and so I'd go stay with my folks or something while he rodeoed, but we
did rodeo, I rodeoed with him a lot and so the kids were little and they saw a lot of
rodeos. So, that's kind of how he learned. Something about that bull riding that drew
his attention from the time he was a little bitty. When we moved down here in '78, he
found out about a little junior rodeo association about around McCallister called the Small
Fry Rodeo Association. He got there in the middle of the season and he won the saddle
for the end of the year. He kind of dominated those. But, he did some struggling, too, but
when Lane won the world's championship, Red Rock was voted the Bucking Bull of the year
and John was going to retire Red Rock because he was getting some age on him, but he came
to Lane and he said, you know, Red Rock is such a great bull, said I really like to do
some kind of grand finale for him. What about if we had some matches between you and Red Rock
And of course, Lane was just tickled to do that because like say he'd bucked him
off twice before and I know maybe both times at the finals, but the one year it did cost
him the winning the world. So, Lane was just tickled, he said oh that would be great, because that
would be kind of like Freckles getting on Tornado with finals, he thought that was
really neat.
Freckles had that cancer, he was down at Houston and Lane was at Fort Worth, but he flew to Houston and stayed in the room with Freckles
that night and he told him the next time I see him, I'm going to win the world for him.
He did, but Freckles wasn't there. Freckles died in March of that year when Lane
won the world in December. Freckles was really special to him.
When we buried Freckles down there, well Lane commented on what a pretty cemetery that was and it was a year or more
before he just got the tombstone done and when she got it done she kind of wanted some
friends to come down and she had kind of a little ceremony and actually asked Lane to
read a poem and Lane don't read well at all. He was just not a good student. He was dyslexic,
struggled you know, but she asked him to read this, it was a Baxter Black poem and he did
a good job, but I'll never forget he was kind of concerned about that. He just wasn't sure
he could read that poem. But he did because Edith asked him to. I remember him talking
about what a pretty cemetery that was, and so that was one of the reasons because we
hadn't lived in Oklahoma long enough that we had any other family buried down here,
we were raised in Colorado and Utah and had family up there, but Freckles was kind of
like family, so that's where we put him. Clyde had a nephew staying here and he came to the
door and I knew I was wanted on the phone and I came in and heard Tough's voice so I
knew Lane was hurt anytime I heard Tough's voice on the phone I knew Lane was hurt. I
said, Tough I know Lane is hurt, how bad is it? He said, well they just pronounced him dead
He pulled his rope tight and Joe Wimberly
and I pulled as hard as we could and then he wanted you pinch it off and hold it for
him and I always hated that, I hated sticking my hands in there, and I always gave him a
hard time about not being able to take his wrap by himself and stuff like that. And I
pulled his rope and then he said, yeah give me a pinch Cody, and that was, shoot,
the last thing he said.
That's pretty neat to come to the gravesite. You wonder how many millions of people
in the last 25 years have come and paid respects. Definitely a legend. Still livin' on.
It's an honor that they want to come and be where Lane was and that's so amazing.
Lane's been gone almost 24 years now and these kids weren't even born then and it's amazing to
me that they still know who he is and look up to him. But it's neat, that they do.