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At 53 and 6-foot-3, Billy Ray Thunder seeks bareback bronco-riding throne
By Nate Ulrich
Beacon Journal sportswriter
Published on Wednesday, Dec 26, 2007
William Ray Higginbottom has suffered several gruesome injuries, including a shattered eye socket, two broken ribs, a broken shoulder, a broken leg and a fractured finger.
He has had six surgeries.
And as Higginbottom talked about his most recent battle wound, a broken left foot, he guaranteed it wouldn't end his career.
Higginbottom, who is better known as Billy Ray Thunder in the rodeo world, is possibly one of the toughest cowboys to come out of Akron.
Higginbottom, a 1973 graduate of Archbishop Hoban High School, has been a bull rider for the past 19 years and a bareback bronco rider for the past four years. Last month in Las Vegas, he accomplished a major goal by competing in the finals of the Bill Pickett Invitational Rodeo, the nation's only touring black rodeo.
''Every rodeo cowboy's dream is just to ride one time in Vegas,'' said Higginbottom, a resident of Red Oak, Ga.
Higginbottom's performance in Las Vegas, however, didn't go as smoothly as planned. During the first round of competition, he fell off the
1,400-pound bronco he was riding, and it stepped on his foot. Higginbottom, 53, said he wanted to continue to compete in the next three rounds with the injury, but he couldn't.
''If the injury wouldn't have been bad, I would have told him (the doctor) to give me something to deaden the pain or put a soft cast on it and I would've came back and rode,'' said Higginbottom, who drives trucks for the restaurant chain Huddle House (which also sponsors his rodeo career). ''But the doctor said, 'If you were younger maybe, but because of your age you're not going to heal like one of those young guys.' I took his advice.''
Thad Heard, who also competed in the Bill Pickett Invitational Rodeo finals, said injuries don't faze his longtime friend, Higginbottom.
''This is a guy that got bit by a spider, and he was determined that he was going to be all right by using home remedies, even though his leg swelled up to the size of an elephant,'' said Heard, who is also a firefighter in Atlanta. ''That's just an example of his determination not to go to the hospital for every little bump.''
After playing in a professional football league in Germany and serving in the Army for six years and the Navy for four years, Higginbottom said his stepbrother, Anthony Winfield, introduced him to rodeo in 1988.
Higginbottom remembers getting injured the first time he rode a bull.
''When that bull came out of there, I think I stayed on for about maybe two seconds,'' Higginbottom said. ''I went up under him, he stepped on me and he broke two ribs. . . . Then it became personal. I said, 'I've got to learn how do to do this.' ''
Higginbottom learned well and has since won two major bull-riding championships, despite being considered somewhat of a misfit in rodeo. Higginbottom said the average bull rider is about 5-foot-6, 160 pounds. The 6-foot-3, 225-pound Higginbottom is still built like he was in the late '70s, when he tried out for the Washington Redskins.
''A lot of people put negative thoughts in your mind,'' Higginbottom said. ''I've met a lot of people who have said, 'You're too old and you're too tall.' ''
Higginbottom said he wants to win a bareback bronco-riding title before he retires, and his most recent injury won't stop him.
''He just doesn't want to get old and quit,'' Heard said. ''He's not ready to sit in a rocking chair and wait for old age to set in. He says that he's going to be the first 60-year-old world champion.''
Higginbottom said he visits high schools in Georgia and tries to encourage young people to try rodeo. But he makes sure to warn them about the inevitable dangers of the sport, and he gives them a taste of the tough-guy philosophy he lives by.
''If you don't have a high tolerance for pain and you're not serious, you're going to get hurt,'' Higginbottom said. ''Don't be out here trying to impress your girlfriend because you can get killed doing this. Usually when a person gets hurt for the first time, if he comes back, he's a cowboy.''
Nate Ulrich can be reached at nateulrich2007@yahoo.com. Read the high school blog at http://www.ohiomm.com/blogs/varsity_letters/.
William Ray Higginbottom has suffered several gruesome injuries, including a shattered eye socket, two broken ribs, a broken shoulder, a broken leg and a fractured finger.
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