Adam Papin/MDN Max’s Ben Kramer rides Black Mamba to the 2023 Badlands Circuit Finals crown over the weekend here in Minot.

From the stands, it looks like an eight-second ballet, as Ben Kramer balances on the bare back of a bucking bronco.

On a horse named Black Mamba, the twenty-two-year-old Max native contorts his body to match every buck. All Black Mamba wants is to throw Kramer off, and all Kramer needs is to stay on until the timer hits eight seconds.

With his left arm thrown high in the air, both for balance and because it’s not allowed to touch the horse, Kramer uses every muscle of his core and legs to press himself as hard as he can to his ride with the goal of winning the bareback riding title of the 2023 Badlands Tour over three nights this weekend in Minot.

“As soon as you nod your head, you have to mark them out of the chutes, and then it’s just all timing,” said Kramer. “You want to set your feet and pull them back again. When the horse is bucking, there are a lot of moving parts.”

He has stiff competition from Rapid City, S.D.’s Shane O’Connell, but Kramer is the third generation to compete, joining his farther, Shawn and grandfather, Jack. Shawn qualified for the Badlands Circuit Finals three times in the 1990s.

Now, Ben has enjoyed the best year of his young career, winning Badlands Circuit rodeos in places like Clear Lake, Brookings, and Watertown, S.D. He’s also won money at big shows in Ft. Worth and Austin Texas and at the Cheyenne, Wyo. Frontier Days.

“I came in with the lead,” said the younger Kramer. “Me and Shane O’Connell are neck and neck a little bit, so that’s made things pretty fun. I drew three really good horses.”

While in high school, Kramer won three North Dakota High School Rodeo Association state titles.

“The thing I’ve always thought about Ben is that he is somebody that just likes to ride bareback horses, and he would do it if nobody was watching,” said Shawn. “If there were no saddles given away or belt buckles to be won, he would still be riding. He just loves riding bareback horses and that really helps him.”

When his chute opens, Kramer withstands everything Black Mamba bucks at him for the requisite eight seconds. With the beep of the timer, he met the standard and now it comes down to the judges.

In the end, Kramer finishes with a three-day total of 240.5 on three head, only two and a half points more than the runner-up, O’Connell. The win not only gave Kramer the belt buckles for winning the Badlands Circuit Finals, but also saw him go home with the saddle trophy for winning the year-end championship.

Both wins also qualify Kramer for the National Rodeo Finals Open, held in Colorado Springs, Colorado, next July.

Other winners from the weekend were saddle bronco rider Cash Wilson, of Wall, S.D. Wilson won both the year-end and finals trophies.

Steer wrestler Cameron Morman is no stranger to Badlands titles. The Glen Ullin, N.D. cowboy won his eighth and ninth gold buckles this year, having won the year-end and finals titles.

In the barrel racing, two veterans claimed wins. Jessica Routier, Buffalo, S.D., won the year-end title aboard her popular palomino horse Fiery Miss West, “Missy,” and Lisa Lockhart, Oelrichs, S.D., won the finals rodeo, on her well-known gray horse, Promise Me Fame Guys, “Levee.”

Mason Moody dominated the bull riding from the start and finished as the only bull rider to make three qualified rides. No one else rode two bulls and only two men, Riggin Shippy and T.J. Schmidt covered one bull.

Other 2023 champions include tie down ropers Grant Turek, St. Paul, Neb. (year-end) and Austin Hurlburt, Norfolk, Neb. (finals), and team ropers Bodie Mattson, Sturgis, S.D. and Cash Hetzel, Lemmon, S.D. (year-end) and Jon Peterson, Belle Fourche, S.D. and Trae Smith, Georgetown, Idaho (finals).