{"id":25455,"date":"2021-06-04T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-06-04T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/web.tarleton.edu\/news\/tarletons-engesser-readies-for-fourth-cnfr\/"},"modified":"2025-09-22T16:44:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-22T21:44:09","slug":"tarletons-engesser-readies-for-fourth-cnfr","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/tarletons-engesser-readies-for-fourth-cnfr\/","title":{"rendered":"Tarleton’s Engesser Readies for Fourth CNFR"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Engesser\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Engesser<\/p>\n

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE<\/p>\n

Friday, June 4, 2021<\/p>\n

STEPHENVILLE, Texas \u2014\u00a0Tarleton State University rodeo team member Rickie Engesser is the model multitasker.<\/p>\n

She has developed elite skills in goat tying, breakaway roping and barrel racing. In fact, she has qualified for the College National Finals Rodeo in all three.<\/p>\n

This year, in her fourth appearance at the annual CNFR in Casper, Wyo., she\u2019ll represent Tarleton in goat tying.<\/p>\n

She and her siblings, a sister and a brother, were in the saddle by age 2. Their father wanted to introduce them all to rodeo when they were young.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe used to rope a lot,\u201d Rickie said. \u201cHe grew up around it and he got us into Little Britches rodeos, then junior high, high school, 4-H, a bunch of associations to keep us going when we were getting started.\u201d<\/p>\n

As a high school standout in Spearfish, S.D., Rickie claimed two national rodeo crowns \u2014 barrel racing in 2014 and goat tying two years later.<\/p>\n

From there, she plied her trade at Gillette College for two years, earning a slot in the 2017 CNFR goat tying, then returning as a breakaway roper in 2018 before donning Tarleton\u2019s purple vest and qualifying in both events as a junior.<\/p>\n

In her final season of college eligibility, Rickie is working on her master\u2019s in consumer research and science and is on track to graduate in December.<\/p>\n

\u201cI always wanted to go down south,\u201d she said. \u201cAfter I went to Gillette, (Tarleton rodeo coach) Mark (Eakins) invited me on a visit and I committed. I really love the campus, and the town is just the right size. I love Texas.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last year, of course, the CNFR fell victim to the pandemic.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was definitely tough, not having the Finals. That\u2019s everybody\u2019s major goal. That\u2019s why we go every weekend for 10 weekends, to make it there. This year we had to stay in that competitive mindset even though we weren\u2019t sure early in the season if we\u2019d have it or not.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had to make sure I didn\u2019t give myself an excuse to not practice. Being up north, I still had places to compete. I still needed to work and practice with a purpose.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cPracticing with a purpose\u201d is Rickie\u2019s mantra as she prepares for the June 13-19 CNFR.<\/p>\n

\u201cI try not to change much, just keep practicing,\u201d she said of her CNFR preparations. \u201cWhat I do work on more is having a purpose for practice. I work on simple things I need to perfect each run, not just practice to practice.\u201d<\/p>\n

Already an active professional rodeo athlete, Rickie has plans past the arena.<\/p>\n

\u201cI do want to rodeo. I\u2019m going to try to go pretty hard this year, but I want to get a sales rep job, as well. I\u2019d like to work for a big feed company or a vaccine company after I finish my graduate degree.\u201d<\/p>\n

Who\u2019s to say she couldn\u2019t do both.<\/p>\n

She has already proved pretty good at multitasking.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tarleton State University rodeo team member Rickie Engesser is the model multitasker.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":25458,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"advgb_blocks_editor_width":"","advgb_blocks_columns_visual_guide":"","wds_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[425],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25455","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-campus-community"],"acf":{"image":false},"author_meta":{"display_name":"keegan","author_link":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/author\/keegan-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2\/"},"featured_img":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/65\/2021\/11\/image-113-300x200.jpg","coauthors":[],"tax_additional":{"categories":{"linked":["Campus & Community<\/a>"],"unlinked":["Campus & Community<\/span>"]}},"comment_count":0,"relative_dates":{"created":"Posted 5 years ago","modified":"Updated 7 months ago"},"absolute_dates":{"created":"Posted on June 4, 2021","modified":"Updated on September 22, 2025"},"absolute_dates_time":{"created":"Posted on June 4, 2021 12:00 am","modified":"Updated on September 22, 2025 4:44 pm"},"featured_img_caption":"Person wearing a cowboy hat and purple vest outdoors.","series_order":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25455","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25455"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25455\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53807,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25455\/revisions\/53807"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25458"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25455"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25455"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarleton.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25455"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}