I rode in the Greeley (Colo.) Stampede tonight, and it went really well. I had a good horse, and I’m splitting the rodeo so far.

But the trip to Greeley hasn’t been without incident. When I got behind the chutes, I changed into my riding pants, put my boots and spurs on and walked out the back gate to the Justin Sportsmedicine trailer. I said hello to the gate man, who was wearing his weekend badge and was wearing his newly acquired authority.

I got my hips worked on by the sportsmedicine team and went to walk back through the gate. That’s when I got stopped by our weekend warrior. He said, “I can’t let you back here.”

I asked why not, and he said, “Well, this is for contestants only! I need to see your PRCA card.”

I told him I didn’t have it on me, so we had to walk into the secretary’s office and look on the bareback riding contestant sheet. Then he had to look at my driver’s license to confirm that I was, actually, Justin McDaniel. I guess he thought I was just some tourist trying to get behind the chutes. Haha.

It’s kind of funny, but I have a request for all rodeo committees out there: Please get gate men that are rodeo savvy!