The American Cowboy Team Roping Association (ACTRA)
is celebrating their 35th anniversary. Through the years
ACTRA has had many success stories.
In the early 80’s, Team Roping was a sport that needed
a place where ropers could go, compete and where the
playing field was fair for all ropers. There had been many
attempts to handicap roping to result in different winners
instead of exclusively the best in the sport. There was
Century Roping, Over Forty Roping, Mixed Roping and
Non-Winner Roping, amongst several others.
A group of arena operators and ropers in California came
up with an idea to handicap ropers by the amount of
money they had won. With the computer being a relatively
new tool, it seemed it might be the answer the team roping
industry needed. Pat Hunnicutt took on the challenge of
gathering data and using it to build a handicap system
based on money won. Thus, the American Computer
Team Roping Association was born (later to be changed
to the American Cowboy Team Roping Association). This
way of handicapping seemed to level the playing field and
team roping started to thrive along with ACTRA. ACTRA
was set up as a non-profit organization owned and
operated by its members. The relationship that was built
between ACTRA and arena operators needs were another
important part of this success.
As the association grew and added more chapters, the
ACTRA National Finals became the focal point of the
association. The National Finals bounced around from
California, Las Vegas, Winnemucca and back to Las
Vegas and finally found their home in Reno, Nevada at the
Reno Livestock Event Center. Reno has become the home
of the ACTRA National Finals for the past twenty years.
The affiliation formulated between ACTRA and the many
businesses in Reno are a great contribution to the
association’s expansion.
Two momentous programs were developed over the years:
BOB BLAIR, National President 559-706-4123
HEIDI FETTIC, National Secretary 775-304-5433
MIKE SWEENEY, National Business Manager
American Cowboy Team Roping Association
Rodeo LIFE 142