SEBRA profile--Blaine Whipp
Can't never could-a word you don't say to Whipp
Don't ever tell Blaine Whipp he can't do something.
When friend and family told him that about bullriding, he set his mind on winning the IFR and did it not once but twice in 2001 and 2002, just one year behind a goal he set for himself to win it in five years.
"If you tell me I can't, I'll show you I can or I'm going to die trying," said the 33-year-old from Myersville, Maryland.
Most recently, he walked away from the SEBRA Championships with almost $10,000 after winning the average for the weekend and finished the 2006 SEBRA season in second place with $13,330.
"I can't explain what winning and success means to me," said Whipp. Normally a no-nonsense, tough-talker, Whipp said he can get choked up when he thinks about the success he's had, defying what everyone told him he couldn't do.
"I was horrible but I never quit. Everybody told me to quit," said Whipp of his first days as a bull rider. Growing up on a dairy farm, he always wanted to be a cowboy but didn't start riding bulls until he was 20.
Before then, Whipp had always watched bull riding on television and wanted to try it but had no idea how or where to get started in Maryland.
At an area bar, he saw someone wearing a bull riding finals jacket who turned out to be Chip Ridgely, a stock contractor near Westminster, Maryland. He talked to him for awhile and found out he ran a practice pen.
Whipp knew he wasn't being taken seriously at first but he showed up every week and developed a reputation for getting on the bulls no one else would get on. Pretty soon, he said they weren't charging him at the pen anymore and just let him get on the stock that scared everyone else.
Whipp has paid his dues and said he'll respect a rider with heart more than a rider with natural talent any day, knowing how hard fought a payout is for someone who has had to work that much harder to learn the skills needed to score in the 80s.
He said every dollar earned at a bull riding is worth more to him than any hundred dollars earned in a regular job in Maryland.
Whipp said people don't expect to find decent cowboys in Maryland and while a handful can be found at some SEBRA events, Whipp said the reason you don't hear of Maryland riders too much is that many of them, even though there are some strong riders, choose not to leave the area.
That wasn't the case for Whipp whose devotion to his bull riding career has seen him live in Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas and Oklahoma, before recently resettling in Maryland for what he knows are the twilight years of his career.
During his career, he's done what nobody said he could and now, as he's getting older, Whipp said he has had to find a new way to push himself.
"I put this chip on my shoulder and dare you to knock it off," he said. "They call me 'Papa' or "Old Man'. I turned it into a little, made up grudge."
He said that's how he now pushes himself to do better--to show them that as he gets older, he can still turn around and have a weekend like he did Jan. 5 at the SEBRA finals.
"I'm running out of time. I'm riding as good as I ever have and I feel good but I'm getting old," said Whipp, who turns 34 in April. Whipp knows his attitude doesn't always show it, but he also knows that next to that chip on his shoulder, he has a place for God in his life and while he keeps that relationship personal, he asserts faith is also an important part of his success.
While you'll still see Whipp at more SEBRA events this year, he has set his sites on making it to the PBR finals before he's willing to hang up his rope.
