They needed to break out the plywood, but the Kinsmen say that this year’s Rainmaker was a big hit. The grandstands were packed last weekend as thousands of area residents came to St. Albert for the 48th annual Rainmaker Rodeo.
They needed to break out the plywood, but the Kinsmen say that this year’s Rainmaker was a big hit.
The grandstands were packed last weekend as thousands of area residents came to St. Albert for the 48th annual Rainmaker Rodeo. The rodeo, which serves as a fundraiser for the Kinsmen Club of St. Albert, featured concerts, lumberjacks, performing dogs, the midway, bucking broncos and plenty of dirt.
It also had a whole lot of people, said rodeo chair Patrick Dower. He was still crunching the numbers on Monday, but he estimated that about 18,000 people turned up for the event — about 25 per cent more than last year.
“It was awesome,” Dower said. The grandstands were “extremely full” for most of the weekend, he said, and organizers had to open up two extra ones at times to accommodate the crowds.
The hot, sunny weather was a big factor in the turnout, Dower said. “We were worried a couple of days before,” he noted, as it had rained a lot, but the skies cleared in time for the event’s start on Friday. He also credited a comprehensive media campaign for getting more people in the stands.
Most of those guests were well behaved, according to police. About 25 people were arrested on alcohol-related charges during the Rainmaker, said Cpl. Laurel Kading of the St. Albert RCMP, a relatively small number that reflects well on the event’s security staff.
“We felt it was very well handled.”
The cowboys and cowgirls did have some problems with potholes, however. Soft spots developed in several parts of the ring during the event that caused bulls and horses to sink into the dirt when they bucked.
“The bulls were in up to their knees” in dirt, Dower said, and the constant trampling turned some of the soft spots into holes.
Stock contractor Steven Trach, who spent much of the Rainmaker in the ring as a pickup man, described the soft spots as a kind of “manmade muskeg.” Soft spots aren’t unexpected in a new site like this, he added. “It’s going to take five years for that ground to settle in.”
The potholes didn’t have any effect on his animals he said — they had no problems sending many a hapless rider hurtling to their doom. “Lots of buck-offs.”
Rodeo crews patched the potholes during the event by laying down plywood and covering it with dirt, Dower said. The Kinsmen were working with the city on a permanent fix.
Dower thanked all the event’s supporters for coming out and said that he was already thinking about what to add to next year’s rodeo.
