The grandstands at Sheridan’s WYO rodeo fill early, long before regular rodeo events begin, welcoming a crowd that’s gathered to watch one of the wildest, most colorful events in all of equine sports. A favorite at powwows and Indian rodeos, the sport of Indian relay racing is a crowd-pleasing spectacle that involves expert horsemanship, teamwork, and the potential for disaster at every turn. The excitement mounts in the stands as the begging of the Sheridan/Wyo rodeo begins, because the first event and crowd favorite is the World champion Indian Relay. Newcomers to this rodeo quickly find themselves caught up in the moment, and the Indian riders and family are excited for the honors won during this race and a hefty payout of 25,000. Indians from all over squash themselves up against the rails to get a close view of the race, and cheer on the riders.

The rules of Indian relay racing, are generally simple, All races are ridden bareback, and teams are composed of four people and three horses. Team members are usually all from the same reservation, and often are members of the same family. Any breed of horse may be entered into the race, years ago saddle horses were raced, but thoroughbreds are todays most common breed. Many are retired racehorses from the horse racing industry. Only one team member competes as jockey, riding all three horses in succession. Sheridan/Wyo is the only relay thats called traditional, because all the riders wear traditional, or as close as they can, traditional native dress. Another team member serves as the “mugger,” catching each finishing horse as the jockey dismounts. The other two team members are “holders” who try to contain and quiet the second and third horses along the arena rail until it’s time for their turn to race.

John Mark Skunkcap from Idaho’s Shoshone-Bannock Reservation, one of the jockeys, is dressed in beaded buckskin moccasins and a buckskin breechcloth, with his forehead painted red and a porcupine roach atop his head. As part of the Mountain Timber team, each horse is adorned with hands prints, circles, or lightning bolts painted on its legs and bodies in the colors of there team. Ashton Old Coyote from the Crow reservation, and a long line of warriors, is also a crowd favorite with lines of paint going down his face and long traditional Crow braids. They are just a few of the many others that are from long lines of warriors and amazing horsemen. All this history lends to the greatest event of horsemanship I have ever seen. each year I drive two hours just to go to the race,…I turn around and go home never bothering to see the rest of the rodeo. I drive back every day four four days. I have never bothered to stay for the rest of the rodeo, lets face it, I have seen a 1000 bucking horses, and seen hundreds of guys throw a rope,…but you have never seen anything like this!

The introduction by Kennard Real Bird from Crow, is worth the drive. It is usually full of jokes, history lessons on how the Indians beat General Custer real bad, just down the road and he usually throws in a few off color remarks just for fun. The crowd loves it and the riders get excited. Kennard starts off ” This is a bunch of wild Indians,…wilder than a bunch of drunk irish white people in a bar in Boston” At a gunshot each jockey leaps aboard his horse and races off past teepees that line the track. A plume of dust rises in their wake. The excitement ramps up as contestants complete the first lap, and by crossing the starting point, leap to the ground, and attempt a quick leap aboard their second horse. Some riders just jump in the air from one horse on to the back of there next mount. As the horses rears up on his hind legs, with a jump he is off down the track. The second and third horses are no longer standing quietly, but jumping and rearing from the excitement and noise around them. Add to all this excitement, the unsuccessful transfers—riders sprawled face down in the dirt of the track or clinging to the side of a horse in a struggle to stay aboard—and it’s easy to see why Indian relay racing is the Sheridan / Wyo crowd pleaser and my personal favorite all time event.

In 1931, the small town of Sheridan, was so quiet you could “shoot a shotgun down Main Street and have no fear of injuring anyone.” A group of local citizens wanted to do something about the situation and decided to put on a rodeo. Since then,… “There’s been a tremendous reception to Indian relay racing,” says Cynde Georgen, Superintendent of the Trail’s End State Historic Site in Sheridan. “Back in the 1920s they had the Indian relay races here and everybody would flock to town for the races. Since they started having them again at the Sheridan WYO Rodeo, it has really revitalized the rodeo.” One spectator in Sheridan observed that Indian relay races have boosted local rodeo attendance, having become “the biggest draw for the rodeo.” And what’s more American than cowboys and Indians?

I decided to paint the rodeo poster for the 2011 Sheridan/Wyo rodeo and as I sat at the trading post of Putt Thompson overlooking Crow, I sketched out exactly what it was going to look like.

I spent 7 years prior, trying to get just the right three riders that would describe best, the event. I went there every year until I had a good idea what it should look like. I also felt it was a great time to put a Indian subject as the main event on a rodeo poster. I felt this would be a real eye grabbing subject and was after all the only reason I drove two hours just to see the race. I was guessing others were as well.

While the exact origins of Indian relay races are blurred by time, Floyd Osborn, a former jockey who is part of a family with a long history of racing horses, says the practice of riding horses in relay sequence may have originated as a way of quickly getting messages of approaching enemies back to tribal leaders. The earliest competitions are believed to date from early rendezvous involving Indians and mountain men in such places as the Green River and Wind River in Wyoming. Osborn, who was born at Fort Washakie on the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming and grew up on Idaho’s Shoshone-Bannock Reservation, is the great-grandson of an Englishman who imported horses from Great Britain. Some of that bloodline remains in Osborn’s string of horses today, and Osborn’s family was among the first to use thoroughbreds in relay racing. He’s seen a number of changes over the years. “It’s a lot faster,” he says about racing today. “The high-powered horses we have now come right off race professional race tracks.

Indian relay racing is a young man’s sport, its fast and dangerous. Tone of the mountain Timber team, recently turned the riding over to his own son, John Mark Skunkcap. He raced in Sheridan with nine stitches in his leg from an earlier race, and still carries scars after getting rubbed on the rail in Pocatello a couple of years ago. “The biggest problems usually occur during exchanges when you’re going out and someone else is coming in,” Tone is the team leader and paints John Mark’s face in preparation for racing events. He also runs practices when the team isn’t competing. “Every day we ride our horses in our field or take them to the track, We practice coming in on them and taking them around the track.” The routine also involves work on jumping off, jumping on, and other maneuvers.” Tone says he feels fortunate to have raced for quite a number of years with no broken bones, although he admits to some pretty good bruises.

Injuries do occur and, as in rodeo, the possibility of a wreck adds to the intensity level. One 16-year-old jockey did suffer a broken ankle during the Sheridan rodeo last summer when a horse reared over backward and fell on him. Another memorable event for me was when a rider got knocked unconscious and was amid the running horses as Kennard Real Bird held the microphone, and loudly said, don’t worry about that warrior, he’s a tough Indian and has a little extra padding,…from sitt’n around all winter on the sofa eating cheese doodles and watching pornographic dvd’s” The crowd hurled a belly laugh, as the rider laid face down knocked out. As he quickly gets dragged off the area floor by a medic crew, fans are witness to a controlled chaos of horses barreling past each other and weaving in and out with riders leaping on and off horses bareback, all amid the calamity, that goes with having 21 horses and 28 team members all on the same track.

Historically many of the Plains People considered the horse an extension of the warrior himself, and showed this by decorating the horse with medicines and visionary paint markings. This relation between man and horse was so closely connected that the protective paint marks were often shared by the horse, the warrior and his shield, and his lodge. Horse medicines could even be used as war charms. Symbols of lightning were painted so others could see and fear that the warrior had a vision that he had been given lightning power.

On the high Plains hail makes every thing cower in the wake of the storm. In Wyoming and South Dakota, summer thunder storms will often drop golf ball to baseball size hail putting fear in everyone in its path. The early people of the high plains understood the fear this had in the mind of an enemy and horses were often painted with hail or lightning.

A friend of mine Mike Cowdrey recently wrote in the book Native American Horse Masks:

“the painting and decoration of a horse shamanically masked a prey animal into a predator and making it an inviolate, symbolic link between warrior and cosmos. Imbued with magic, the warriors steed now rode with the power of thunder, and lightning. The visionary power of the shaman transformed a beast of burden into a lethal engine of war.”

Similar to years ago, the people of the Northern Plains Nations still paint there horses on special occasions with the same symbols passed down by there ancestors.

Each Summer, in Wyoming, the Indian people paint there horses during the World Championship Indian Relay races. Symbols of power are used on there “war ponies” in the race. Every year during the Indian relay races, a holy man or elder will paint a riders horse with marks of power and for others to fear. Today, just as years ago, the horse and rider are painted with the same marks. Parallel lines for coupe marks, dots for hail, a circle around the eye to improve the animals vision, and often large zigzags for lightning.

The races are spectacular demonstrations of the best horsemanship in the world. The bareback warriors grasp to there horses, in a race for honor, in a spectacle like few have seen. My jaw is agape every year I go.

While filled with the danger inherent in any Indian relay event, Indian relay racing keeps alive something less dramatic but no less vital—a direct link to Native American traditions and heritage, and an important point of connection among families.

Bob Coronato

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