Back in 1991 country music superstar Garth Brooks recorded a huge hit song titled “Rodeo”. The song chronicles the life of a cowboy who gets the rodeo bug so deep in his blood that he is willing to sacrifice just about anything for the thrill of the sport. Young Callaway cowboy Kaleb Hunt will tell you that feeling is very real. And the bug? Well, he has caught it.

The son of Nate and Tina Hurt of rural Callaway, Kaleb is a 2023 graduate of Broken Bow High School. He first became interested in rodeo early in his high school years.

“I wanted to ride bulls at first. I just started riding colts and I just craved when they bucked and was obsessed with the idea of becoming a PBA champion one day,” shared an enthusiastic Hurt. “I went over to Lexington and rode a few bulls in a practice pen one day, but I was just too tall and lanky and discovered it wasn’t for me, which was kind of a bummer.”

He said it was the suggestion of a fellow cowboy, Marty Legett of Broken Bow, that led to him trying saddle bronc riding. “I went and spent about $2,500 and got everything rounded up. I went over to Ord and got on my first bucking horse and got utterly wiped out. I rode three that day and just got slammed hard. But at that moment I just became addicted to it and have just craved it ever since,” said Hurt.

Hurt began participating in high school rodeo during his sophomore year and said that he spent the first two years just trying to get the hang of it. He was also working at a feedlot and on the family farm.

“In the summer between my junior and senior year I went to Colorado and rode a bunch of horses and was working with some NFR qualifiers, some of the best in the world right now,” Hurt said. “They taught me a lot and taught me that this isn’t something you do as a hobby. If you’re going to do it you do it. If you’re just doing it for fun you need to just quit.”

Hurt said that was a pivotal moment for him, and when he made the decision to go all in on rodeo. “I began to put a lot of money into it and put a lot of miles on my pickup,” he said. “This season I did not miss one high school rodeo. I missed my own high school graduation to go to a high school rodeo and get on a bucking horse.”

At the end of last year’s spring high school rodeo season, Hurt was sitting in first place in bronc riding. He was holding tight to the number one spot at the end of this past fall season as well, heading into the finals at Burwell in first place.

“The first day I covered a horse that wasn’t really bucky and I got third place. The second day I got on a horse that had actually bucked me off and beat me up pretty good in Thedford, and as soon as he came out of the shoot and his front feet hit the ground he turned left and I came off the side and hung up my left stirrup and I couldn’t jump off or get away from the horse and he took me under him,” Hurt recalled. “My foot popped out and he stepped on the back of my neck and knocked me out and gave me a concussion. That was round two of state finals.”

At the end of that round, he was sitting in second place by just a few points, but he was not willing to give up. “All I had to do was get first or second in the short go,” he said. “But I was throwing up and just getting very dizzy and lightheaded. There were times I would forget where I was at. It was pretty bad. That next day before