Shelley Morgan has been around horses her since she was old enough to sit up on one.
Her dad was a calf roper and Morgan was on a drill team with her mom and sister until she began barrel racing in the Central Rodeo Association most weekends in Jr. High and high school.
“I would think it was so cool because I would get picked up from school every now and again early and go to a rodeo,” she said.
Morgan and her sister had always trained their own horses and after she started training her horse Short Go in college, she eventually decided to buy her pro card following a trip to the UPRA Finals and some encouragement from her husband.
“I would have never ever brought my pro card had he not guided me into it,” she said.
Before rodeoing full time, Morgan had two kids and taught and coached basketball for seven years and now she is finding plenty of success as a barrel racer.
“I guess God kind of knew the plan for my life because while I was getting married and having kids, I really didn’t have a horse to go, go, go.......I was training and going to more local stuff,” she said. “Which ended up being perfect for where I was in my life.”
Morgan spent much of the 2021 season No. 1 in the WPRA World Standings thanks to a win at the Ram National Circuit Finals in April and she will enter her third Wrangler NFR ranked No. 3. She is less than $20,000 behind first-place Hailey Kinsel. Morgan’s other two trips to the NFR came in 2009 and 2020.
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RNCFR Barrel Racing Champion Shelley Morgan joins WSR