Two seconds in, I know I'm in trouble. Each buck from the 2,000-pound bull beneath me sends my feet sailing higher into the air and thrusts my face closer to his dirt-tipped horns. What had been, albeit briefly, a coordinated dance between man and beast now seems more like a suicide mission. Bracing myself with my right hand, I try to yank my left from the rope that anchors me to his back. It doesn't budge. More terrified, I try again. This time it pulls free, just in time for one last upward thrust. I carom off of his right flank and land with a thwap on the arena's hard, earthen floor. Bullfighters spring into action, distracting the beast long enough for me to hurdle over the nearest fence to safety.
"That son of a buck pancaked your ass," shouts Gary Leffew from his observation booth, flashing a smile that matches the curve of his cowboy hat. "Come on over and I'll show you what you did wrong."
Leffew, a former world-champion bull rider and veteran of the sport, has been teaching students the art of bull riding for the past decade on his private ranch near the Los Padres National Forest in California. Most of his trainees are young -- the average age is 19 -- nearly all hail from Canada, Mexico, and the western United States, and every last one shares a common goal: to become the next Tuff Hedeman, Lane Frost, or Donny Gay, modern-day legends in a sport that knows no shortage of tough-guy heroes. Theirs is a world that is lived 8 seconds at a time, and Leffew's 2-week boot camp will teach them the timing, technique, and mental calm to ride any bull that comes their way. For me, it's a chance to experience something I've dreamed about since attending my first rodeo 20 years ago: the rush of pitting myself against an opponent that's 10 times my weight, severely ill-tempered, and bred for one purpose only -- bucking cowboys.
