(upbeat music) (horse galloping) - The idea to bring skijoring to Sheridan really started with this idea that to impact winter here locally from an economic standpoint.

Fast-forward to that Saturday night after the event, we were immediately the largest skijoring race in America, and we had more than 5,000 people come out for the event.

The next year, we doubled everything.

It's such a powerful economic tool for our community.

(pensive music) The last two years, we had some struggles with Mother Nature, the COVID year, and last year, there was no snow.

That kinda got us thinking like, "What do we do?

If we plan this again, a third year in a row, for downtown, and can't pull it off because of lack of snow, you're pretty much all but killing this thing."

So we looked at the Fairgrounds, and we said, "You know what?

We hope that people wanna go up there.

We've packed that place, they have a great time."

Our fingers are crossed, it's free and open to the public, so we don't know until tomorrow the number of people that are gonna show up, but we're hoping it's several thousand.

(digger engine rumbling) (digger clanging) (snowplow engine rumbling) Hanns and I are the other side of the coin from one another.

He's the the race programmer, so he takes care of course design, track building.

He's an engineer.

- I designed the courses, I shoot for an 80% success rate.

It's a good fun course, it's safe, and you can basically make it as hard as you want just by adding a little bit more speed.

(upbeat music) (footsteps crunching) So you can imagine coming over here, the skier will come over here, put his arm out, collect three big rings on his arm, and then grip the rope.

(audience cheering) And then come back over here and send it.

That's a rush, you come down here and you'll sail through the finish line.

(audience cheering) And they're all cheering you on.

It feels really good.

Well, I think it'll be a great turnout, yeah.

The positive thing about up here is there's 4,500 very good seats right behind me, and then we have some standing room in the arena area.

So I think they're gonna find that it was a good move.

(upbeat music) (truck engine rumbling) (attendees faintly speaking) - The last time I got to race here was two years ago, and I raced Sundance and Sheridan that year, and that was kinda my first experience with skijoring.

It's an adrenaline rush, I guess.

You're pulling together skiers and horsemen and cowboys, and it's just this, it's this really different dynamic that you don't really get to see in a lot of places.

- Sheridan is all about rodeo and cowboy and ranching, but yet there's this whole other dynamic to it as well.

And so it's just a unique experience to be able to blend everybody together.

And I think it'll be right up at the Fairgrounds, and seating for people and places for people to get warm, and so I'm excited about that.

- From a horseman's perspective, we care about our animal athletes deeply.

Just running down snow, on concrete, the odds of injury go up.

And so I think the move to the Fairgrounds is a step in the direction of pushing the sport in Wyoming.

- [Announcer] Good morning, Sheridan County.

I'd certainly like to welcome you all to the Sheridan County Fairgrounds.

Enjoy your day today, go downtown and enjoy the downtown community after the event is over.

Thank you.

- I'm feeling really good, yeah.

It's gonna be awesome.

44 runs, got a huge crowd, perfect day for skijoring.

I mean, it doesn't get any better.

(upbeat music) - [Announcer] Flag is up.

Make some noise as they come down.

(audience cheering) (ice scratching) (audience cheering and clapping) - The strategy for skijoring is proper rope management.

So if you watch these guys, they're gonna be crawling up and down that rope the entire course length.

And that is the key to being successful at skijoring.

(ice scratching) (audience cheering) - We've come up with some crazy programs, and some of them are eyebrow-raising for people at the beginning, but it always comes from a place of caring about this community.

And when people try something, especially something as crazy and wild as skijoring, you see this huge groundswell of people come together.

So if the community says that this is something that they want and we believe that it's gonna benefit the people of Sheridan County, we're gonna do it.

This is just one of those ways where we partner, we give back, and we try and do what we can for our town.

(upbeat music)