Get your chaps and Chapstick on — Colorado’s Steamboat Ski Resort celebrates its 50th rodeo on skis this January with its Cowboy Downhill.
What happens when you put a champion skier and champion cowboy together? Ask Billy Kidd about the time Larry Mahan called him with a simple request.
A former World Cup and Olympic medalist alpine ski racer, Kidd had headed to Steamboat Springs, Colorado, in 1970 to begin what would become a five-decade-plus stint as Steamboat Resort’s skiing director. Four years into marrying his skiing expertise and love of the Western lifestyle, he got a fateful phone call.
“Larry [Mahan] called me up and said, ‘I want to learn to ski, and I heard you’re the guy to teach me,’” Kidd remembers. They met, they skied, they had fun. The next year, the six-time all-around World Champion cowboy brought along a couple of friends — all fellow rodeo stars — and the rest is Steamboat history.
“When you get two or three rodeo cowboys together, you’ve got a contest,” Kidd says. Riding a mountain of pow- der and a spirit of camaraderie and competition, the cowboys had a blast. Their informal contest on snow made for one heck of a memorable day of skiing.
That, Kidd says, was the beginning of the Cowboy Downhill. “And we haven’t looked back since!”
Cowboy Downhill founders eight-time world champion rodeo cowboy Larry Mahan, left, and Olympic silver medalist skier Billy Kidd reunited at the 40th anniversary of the event at the Steamboat Ski Area on January 20, 2014. Photography: Tom Ross / Steamboat Pilot & Today News Archive.
The Intersection of Rodeo and Skiing
This January, the beloved Steamboat tradition celebrates 50 years of the rowdiest event on skis. Now bringing more than 100 of the top rodeo athletes from across the U.S., Australia, Europe, Canada, and Mexico together to compete on the slopes, the Cowboy Downhill is a wild mashup of skiing and rodeo that has to be seen to be believed.
But it’s not as unlikely a hybrid as you might imagine.
“I think the common denominator between the people that race and live on the edge in the ski world is the same with the guys in the rodeo,” Mahan, who died in May 2023, told C&I. “They are thrill-seekers.”
And it’s thrilling to watch. “There’s no other event like the Cowboy Downhill,” says Dave Hunter, Steamboat Ski Resort’s president and CEO. “Professional cowboys are all about the heat of competition, and Steamboat knows compe- tition better than any ski resort in the country, so combining the two for the entertainment of all is a natural fit. And we’re really proud to be celebrating the 50th anniversary of this iconic event.”
It’s not everywhere that folks who love the Western lifestyle can take that passion straight to the slopes, but in Steamboat, you’ll see plenty of cowboy hats on the mountain and cowboy boots apres-ski. And it’s no accident that the ski resort times the Cowboy Downhill to coincide with Denver’s National Western Stock Show—rodeo athletes and fans need only hop in the car for a three-hour drive from Denver to attend both events in one weekend.
A cowboy hat and chaps are required attire for cowboys and cowgirls competing in the Cowboy Downhill.
The Cowboy Downhill Competition
The Cowboy Downhill consists of two events: a slalom and the Stampede. If it sounds like a free-for-all, it’s not. This seemingly unruly event definitely has rules. Before competing, skiers must qualify. All Cowboy Downhill participants must be a member of the PRCA or PBR and should be entered in the National Stock Show & Rodeo in Denver (January 11–26, 2025). A cowboy hat and chaps must be worn during the competition.
Once a cowboy or cowgirl passes the entry requirements, it’s time to saddle up and schuss.
First, cowboys and cowgirls shoot down the dual slalom course, over a jump, lasso a person, saddle a horse, and cross the finish line. Then it’s on to the Stampede, which is pretty much what it sounds like: a thundering mass start and winner-takes-all race down the towering slopes to the bottom. The first cowboy or cowgirl across the finish line wins.
In addition to a first-place prize for each event, Steamboat Ski Resort also awards one lucky (or unlucky) contestant the coveted title of Best Wreck. Crashing into a flag or tripping over your skis might leave you bruised, but you may also leave with a trophy.
Competitors must lasso a person and saddle a horse as part of the first event.
The Legacy
Each year, one individual who is an exemplary ambassador of Steamboat Springs’ Western culture makes it into the exclusive Legends & Founders Club at an annual induction ceremony honoring the folks who have played an instrumen- tal role in founding and continuing the Cowboy Downhill. Along with original founders Billy Kidd and Larry Mahan, past inductees include 1982 PRCA World Champion Charlie Sampson, three-time PRCA World Champion and PBR World Champion Tuff Hedeman, National Rodeo Hall of Famer Bobby DelVecchio, and Olympic alpine skier Jim “Moose” Barrows.
When the gun goes off and hundreds of cowboys and cowgirls go bombing down the powdery slopes in chaps and hats, it’s the perfect, if incongruous, coming together of the elite worlds of rodeo and skiing. And to think it all started 50 years ago when two take-no-prisoners competitors, dirt legend Larry Mahan and powder legend Billy Kidd, formed a friendship and birthed a legendary event with a simple phone call and a day on a mountain.
Steamboat Springs in northwest Colorado is home to both the Steamboat Ski Resort and Steamboat Pro Rodeo, which attract overlapping crowds. A major snow-sport destination, “The Boat” and the surrounding area were originally inhabited by the Utes, who hunted the valley in summers before being forcibly removed to a reservation in Utah by the U.S. Army beginning in 1879.
Cowboy Downhill Schedule
The 50th anniversary festivities begin on Sunday, January 19. The competition kicks off on Monday, January 20, followed by live music and more festivities to conclude the event.
Sunday, January 19, 2025
5 p.m. – 6 p.m.
Cowboy Up Drone Show, at the base of the mountain. The drone show takes to the skies around 5 p.m. with a dazzling display showcasing the essence of Steamboat and celebrating the 50th anniversary of Bud Light Cowboy Downhill.
Monday, January 20, 2025
11 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.
Festivities for the 50th Annual Bud Light Cowboy Downhill include a Western celebration in Gondola Square featur- ing 4H farm animals, appearances by the Denver Broncos Cheerleaders, and additional activations.
1 p.m. – 50th Annual Steamboat Cowboy Downhill
2:30 p.m. – Bud Light Rocks the Boat Concert.
For more information about Steamboat Cowboy Downhill, visit steamboat.com.
Photography: Courtesy Steamboat Ski Resort
