Chelsea Carroll is more than just a hat and saddle.
The McNeese State senior, who qualified for the College National Finals Rodeo in breakaway roping and goat tying, is also preparing to start law school at Southern University in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, this fall.
Carroll’s life, for the last four years, has been an overwhelming cocktail of rodeo practice, studying, work at an attorney’s office and the occasional hour of sleep in between. It’s a prodigious schedule, where free hours are scarce and responsibilities are juggled and managed on a day-to-day basis.
But if you ask Carroll, she can’t imagine any other life.
“It was a lot, don’t get me wrong. I slept maybe 5-6 hours per night,” Carroll said after her run in breakaway roping on Sunday. “It just became a routine, and I loved every part of it. I don’t like just sitting around.”
Carroll’s various and simultaneous pursuits culminated in a perfect storm on the weekend of Oct. 4 last year. The McNeese State cowgirl and her father, former CNFR qualifier Brian Carroll, embarked on an eight-hour drive from Lake Charles, Louisiana, to Uvalde, Texas, for a college rodeo on Thursday, Oct. 3.
On Friday, Carroll competed in breakaway roping and goat tying, before turning around, jumping back in the car and arriving home in Lake Charles at 4 a.m. Saturday morning.
Carroll’s previous days had consisted of lots of rodeo and open road, and very little sleep. But there were no excuses.
No matter the circumstances, the LSAT (Law School Admission Test) doesn’t care.
“I didn’t sleep much. I drank coffee,” Carroll said. “I never did that until I got to college.”
Carroll took the LSAT at 8 a.m. that same Saturday morning, enduring a draining five-hour academic siege before finally putting her pencil down in triumph.
Her day wasn’t over, however. She would soon be tested in another familiar arena.
One of Carroll’s teammates also took the LSAT at a site two hours away, and his father arranged a private plane to fly him back to Uvalde for the final round of the rodeo when his exam was completed. When Carroll turned on her cell phone after finishing her own test, she found several messages from coaches and teammates.
If she could reach the plane in an hour before it took off, she could also compete in the rodeo’s final round.
“They said, ‘You have an hour to get here,’” Carroll said. “It was a two-hour drive, so I probably didn’t drive that safe.”
When the plane lifted skyward, Carroll was in it. Having not expected to make it back for the rest of the rodeo, she arrived in shorts and a T-shirt. Her rodeo clothes and gear were at home, as was the horse she had used for the previous eight years.
To be able to compete, Carroll wore someone else’s clothes and rode someone else’s horse. While her rope didn’t end up landing snugly around the calf’s neck in the final go-round that night, it wasn’t for a lack of trying.
For Carroll, it was a dizzying weekend that exemplified the struggle — and satisfaction — that comes with commitment both on the dirt and inside the classroom.
“That was an awesome weekend,” Carroll said. “It was definitely one to remember.”
As Carroll will soon learn, however, you can only juggle so much for so long before one of the balls falls. The senior plans to hang up her saddle for a few years to focus on law school — environmental law, specifically — at Southern.
Rodeo is a priority, but it doesn’t top the list.
“I have two daughters, and we’ve always told them rodeoing is good. It’s a great life,” Carroll’s father, Brian Carroll, said. “But your education comes first. She has set her goal. For years, she wanted to go to law school.
“She’s going to put the rodeoing aside and get a law degree, and maybe get back into it later.”
Carroll’s first run at the CNFR was a forgettable one, as her lasso missed its mark and the calf ran free in Sunday’s first go of breakaway roping.
In a black vest and white hat, Carroll rode out of the arena with her head down, gathering up the white rope in her hands.
But regardless of one particular event or tournament, Carroll will continue pushing to win — at rodeo, at life, at whatever she gets her hands on.
And as it happens, her next challenge is an academic one.
“I’m a competitor, no matter what it is. From softball to volleyball to rodeo, even if I’m not good at something, I want to win,” Carroll said, minutes after her empty run. She shrugged and looked up.
“I’m going to win with the books now, I guess.”
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