The combination of clay, sand, and topsoil is the rodeo’s secret ingredient.
The rodeo dust awoke on February 24 and determined to take a rain verify. It was purported to be the day the cautious mixture of clay, sand, and topsoil was scheduled to be moved into NRG Stadium for the annual Houston Livestock Present and Rodeo. However due to the earlier weekend’s rains, the dust was a tad moister than its optimum stage of 12 to 18 p.c—and a real diva will get away from bed solely when she’s prepared.
Yearly, the identical assortment of dust is pushed into the world per week earlier than the rodeo begins. It’s in any other case ready patiently on an HLSR property positioned off 288 and Reed Highway, about three miles from NRG, till it’s summoned by the truckload. In the event you suppose such treasured earth would stay locked up inside a safe fortress, you’d be mistaken. It’s anticlimactically coated with a tarp in the course of a car parking zone all 12 months, although generally it will get denuded to permit for aeration. Nevertheless, the crew simply accomplished development on a brand new facility befitting the dust’s gravitas, the place it’s going to settle into its subsequent hibernation till the 2026 rodeo calls it again into service.
HLSR’s dust solely makes an look in public annually, so get pleasure from this second whereas it lasts.
The dust used within the 2025 festivities is about three years outdated. HLSR switches it out each decade, sourcing it from North Houston Trucking, which additionally handles the logistics of bringing it throughout from its car parking zone house to its once-a-year office. When the rodeo doesn’t want it, the dust doesn’t have to choose up any freelancing on the aspect—one gig is all it wants.
“The rodeo is the one occasion that dust is used for. We don’t use it for some other occasions on this property. It’s a completely totally different dust than what they use when Monster Jam or the monster vans come. Supercross is an entire totally different dust,” says Bobby Richardson, HLSR’s director of buildings and grounds says.
After basking within the solar all day this previous Monday, the dust was primed for a Tuesday morning departure. At 7:45am, the primary vans rolled into an in any other case quiet and empty NRG Stadium, releasing massive mounds onto the concrete ground, the dump physique flaps clapping again with a humongous bang echoing all through the world. It takes 40 vans carrying greater than 550 masses over six to eight hours to fill the grounds with 4,000 cubic yards of dust, layered evenly at 18 inches deep.
Over 4,000 cubic yards of dust are unfold through the Houston Livestock Present and Rodeo’s Dust Day.
These aren’t arbitrary numbers. HLSR dust serves as a cushion for all of the energetic hoofed mammals collaborating within the month’s professional rodeo competitions—and for the cowboys who take fairly a number of tumbles.
“You need to just be sure you have a steady floor for the animals’ footing. The stadium has a cement ground, and so that you deliver within the dust and construct it up…that manner, their ft as they’re turning and twisting [and] their hooves don’t undergo the dust and hit that cement the place it’s slippery,” Richardson says. “You need them to have good footing. It’s all concerning the welfare of the animals.”
A complete of 40 vans labored all day to haul within the rodeo’s very particular dust.
He and his crew run each day checks on the dust to ensure the moisture ranges stay steady. Too dry or too moist will increase the danger of one of many animals struggling an damage out on the sphere. Richardson mentions that he’ll ball up handfuls of the dust to gauge the standard in numerous areas. If it feels too dusty or crumbly, it could require some tilling to dredge up moister layers from the underside.
“It’s sort of only a really feel that you simply’re in search of. Every occasion is totally different. Your barrel racers, they like their dust a sure manner, the place your ropers could like their dust a unique manner. Your bulldoggers…they’re going to need it a unique manner,” Richardson says. “So that you attempt to discover that pleased medium in there.”
With a lot care put into the dust, you’d suppose it would tempt some rodeo goers. Baseball followers have been identified to sneak some dust house as a memento, particularly after important video games. Chief present operations officer Mike DeMarco, who oversaw the dust commute on Tuesday, doesn’t consider this occurs a lot on the rodeo, however that doesn’t imply there haven’t been any daring escapes.
“I’m certain these cowboys take dust out of right here in some way,” he laughs.
