"When Dad was sick there wasn't a lot he could do and I was the oldest so I had to be around. And then after he died I had to stay around. I'd do two or three rodeos a year, like Normanton and Cloncurry in '84 and '85, just to go out. And I knew nothing about riding at that time - I was like an old ringer turning up and getting on. I started riding all the roughstock events, but not having any money to pay entries or buy the gear, I ended up just riding bulls.
 
"Everyone when they start would like to be successful and the first bull they get on or the first rope they throw, they want to be World Champions and that's what keeps everyone going. Because no one knows who's going to be the next World Champion - it doesn't matter what sport it is. When I was 19 or 20 odd I was a pretty big fellow and it's a lot harder for a big person to learn to ride than it is for a smaller person because of your centre of balance. A person three inches shorter than me is not much weaker and could even be stronger. So if a bull rocks him or rolls him to get his body tipped, there's less chance of him getting tipped one way or the other. Whereas if you've got a big person riding a bull he's got to try and be perfect all the time. Small people can get into trouble and get back out.
 
"I could never ride consistently. I'd ride a few good bulls here and there and win some money, but then I'd get thrown off a few and I was feeling just as good as when I was riding them, so I don't know why I got thrown off. Consistency doesn't really matter when you're young. If you get thrown off two or three bulls in a row, what does time matter? You can get on the next one. But there are only one or two APRA rodeos a weekend and I can't afford to sit down in Victoria somewhere while everything's to be done up here.
 
"Unless you practise all the time, you're not competitive either. The bulls I've got around here are all grass-fed and grain-fed bulls are about three gears faster, all souped-up and athletic and used to being bucked. You can get on a grass-fed bull ten times a day and he won't throw you off, but then when you go to a rodeo you can get thrown off as soon as the gate opens.
 
"If you're fulltime rodeoing like Grant Wells, you need four or five days off to think about something else and turn up fresh to the next one. But when you have a break of two or three months between events, you'd get there and wouldn't know which side to put your bull rope down.
 
"For the last three or four years I've probably only done three APRA rodeos. I probably did about a dozen last year, just around the north. It gives you a break away, otherwise you'd just work seven days a week and you wouldn't do anything else. Rosemary, my wife, comes to rodeos close by, but she reckons bullriding is just something I do and doesn't bother watching them all. It's my bag. My kids are 8, 6 and 4 and I'd probably try and steer them away from it. There's no money in it. It's probably only the top two or three out of each event that make any money out of it at the end of the year.
 
"Not that you don't like to win. That probably keeps you going as long as possible."