PUEBLO, Colo. – Mike Lee has had this anxious, thrilling feeling deep inside him when it comes to riding the rankest of bulls ever since he was a little kid.
During his teenage years, Lee and some buddies would sometimes get on 10 or more bulls in one day. It was challenging. It was nerve racking. It was exciting.
Most of all, he had a bull riding hunger that needed to be fed from sunrise to sunset.
Fast forward to 2014, and the 31-year-old has been keeping a special eye on one marquee, rank PBR bull.
The 2004 World Champion has been breathing, thinking and, yes, even dreaming about two-time World Champion Bull Bushwacker after it was announced that this season would be the legendary bull’s last.
Just last month in Bismarck, North Dakota, Lee attempted to convince Bushwacker’s owner Julio Moreno – to no avail – to let the Decatur, Texas, native climb aboard his prized possession on the second night of Chad Berger’s Touring Pro Division event.
After a series of conversations and offers from Berger, Moreno politely declined out of fairness to his bull. He had only planned on bucking Bushwacker once in Bismarck, and after years of competing as a team roper, Moreno said he had learned to normally stick to his original plans.
However, Lee will get the opportunity to face the bull he has been studying all year long in seven days when he takes on Bushwacker during a special $10,000 bounty matchup at the Salinas, California, TPD event.
The July 16th event will be streamed live on PBR LIVE and fans can sign up here to watch the Battle of Champions.
“I have been wanting to get on him for a long time and way before this,” Lee said. “Ever since I was a kid, rank bulls make me a little nervous, but it also kind of makes me water at the mouth. Kind of like when I eat a steak. It’s an itch and you have to scratch it all the time.
“That is what is it’s about for me. It is not about being famous or a hero. I am just craving it.”
It will be the third meeting between the two PBR champions. They last met in February 2013 when Bushwacker took care of business in 3.11 seconds at the Built Ford Tough Series event in Kansas City, Missouri. Bushwacker was marked 48 points, which is tied for the third-highest mark of his career. He also gave Lee a parting gift and popped the BFTS veteran on the helmet.
Two years earlier, Bushwacker bucked off Lee in 2.49 seconds during a BFTS event in Oklahoma City.
Lee can’t take much solace in what he may have learned from his two previous encounters. Bushwacker has become notorious for being unpredictable and is viewed as one of the smartest bulls in the PBR.
“He is one of the greatest bulls that has ever come along,” Lee said. “He is definitely one of the strongest bulls. He is real deep in the front-end body, which makes him really have a lot of down pressure on your hand and your upper body. It is hard to control your upper body on him. That is where he is bucking everybody off at.”
Bushwacker will enter Salinas with 16 consecutive combined buckoffs at BFTS and TPD events since J.B. Mauney, who will face Bushwacker again on July 31 in Santa Barbara, California, conquered the bull last August in Tulsa, Oklahoma, for 95.25 points.
Moreno plans on hauling Bushwacker to Salinas the day of the event, and this week, he will follow a similar workout routine for his bull that he did prior to Bismarck, where Bushwacker bucked off J.W. Harris in under 4 seconds.
Temperatures at Moreno’s Oakdale, California, ranch were soaring into the triple digits this week and the stock contractor is going to make sure Bushwacker gets extra fluids and electrolytes leading up to next week.
Despite the heat, Moreno is confident Bushwacker will be ready for his next challenger when he arrives in the cooler Salinas, which is roughly 20 minutes from the Pacific Ocean.
“It will be a great matchup,” Moreno said. “I will have Bushwacker ready for him and I imagine he will be ready. It will be champion against champion.”
Not one rider has been able to get beyond the 4-second mark on Bushwacker since Nathan Schaper lasted 4.59 seconds aboard the bovine at the Anaheim, California, BFTS event in February.
He also believes there is a good chance the rider currently ranked fourth in the world standings can challenge Bushwacker, because he has the mental confidence to do so. When Lee is focused and healthy, he is one of the best, says Moreno.
Not many riders approach Moreno about getting on Bushwacker, but Lee has even made it known in the past that he would do it for free for practice at Moreno’s ranch. In Bismarck, Moreno could sense that Lee not only wanted to face Bushwacker, but that he truly believed he could make the 8-second mark.
“Mike Lee was craving it and he wanted to have him,” Moreno recalled.
Two-time World Champion Justin McBride said in Bismarck that one of the biggest storylines this summer has been Lee’s continued success during the summer break.
At the time, Lee was coming off three consecutive TPD wins heading into Bismarck.
“This is a guy 10 years after winning his World Championship and it looks like he can do it again,” McBride said. “He is riding that good.”
As of July 9, Lee has nearly cut world leader Guilherme Marchi’s hold on the top spot in half (1,261.12 points) since Last Cowboy Standing, and he now only trails the 2008 World Champion by 1,288.25 points.
RELATED: Mike Lee compares Bushwacker to Goliath
Lee is currently at the Calgary Stampede and rode his first bull in Pool B action on Tuesday when he scored 83 points on Stupid Trent.
However, Lee is coming off the most impressive TPD performance of the summer after going a perfect 6-for-6 on the Fourth of July to win first (171.5 points), second (170.5) and third (169.5) at the Lancaster, California, event.
He used three separate entries to qualify for the short round three times. He then rode all of his short-round bulls in a matter of minutes with no time to really rest between rides. Lee’s success in Lancaster pocketed him close to $18,000 at the $20,000-added event.
“I’ve never done that before,” Lee said. “All of my bulls were really good and they all bucked. I think I knew it was possible, but sometimes you make little mistakes and it messes one bull up. That is a good reason to enter more than once, because if you mess up once, you can fix it again. Sometimes it doesn’t take very long to fix.”
Except he didn’t mess up – not even once last Friday. Lee rode six bulls in roughly a couple of hours at one event – a simply unheard of accomplishment in the PBR. Lee averaged 85.25 points per ride.
Lee has always said that he enjoys entering multiple times at TPD events because it keeps his mind at ease and he worries less when climbing into the chutes. Instead of being concerned with messing up, he knows in the back of his head there will be another opportunity.
In Lancaster, he made sure to try and stay loose in between rides.
“I was just concentrating on breathing and was just going with the flow and focusing on my stamina,” Lee said. “When you’re getting on that many bulls you don’t really think about anything other than just keeping the oxygen so your muscles don’t lock up.”
Lee admits he hasn’t been able to do much working out this year because of his past knee injuries. He can’t do much running due to his back going out on him if he runs crooked. Instead, he focuses on exercising his quads and thighs as a way to make up for the injuries in his knees. He also gets massages frequently to help his body recover.
Regardless, Lee is riding as strong as ever this summer.
The question is does he have enough in him to tame the nearly unrideable Bushwacker?
“I just have to remember to stay small,” Lee said. “He has that real big jump out of there and I am just really looking forward to going ahead and doing it.”
RELATED: Julio Moreno excited to bring Bushwacker to historic Salinas rodeo
Moreno hopes Lee can give Bushwacker a run for his money so that, in turn, Bushwacker can remind everyone of how good he is when his back is up against the wall.
“Hopefully, he can ride him those two or three jumps that he does and turns back with him and make that round and we will get to see Bushwacker,” Moreno said. “If Mike is on, he has a chance.”
PBR Director of Livestock Cody Lambert said last week, before the matchup between Lee and Bushwacker was finalized, that one thing would be for sure if the 5-foot-9 rider were to try Bushwacker before the end of the season.
“If Mike Lee gets on him, you are going to see a real effort,” Lambert said. “He might not ride him, but you will see an effort.”
Before leaving for Australia, Brendon Clark, who will be serving as the color commentator in Salinas, mentioned Lee as a rider he hoped to see get an opportunity to face Bushwacker in Salinas.
The 11-year BFTS veteran spent numerous seasons competing alongside Lee – the 2008 Calgary Stampede champion – and said that many people lose track of Lee and how talented he truly is.
During Clark’s second year on tour, Lee became the first rider in PBR history to win both the World Championship and the World Finals event title.
“No one has really mentioned that guy’s name,” Clark said. “He flies under the radar sometimes and we forget that he is a World Champion and has won a couple million dollars in this sport. If I was going to be putting my money on someone that I think might be able to ride Bushwacker at that event, Mike Lee would be my pick.”
Come Salinas, the 13-year BFTS veteran hopes Bushwacker will turn back after the bull’s initial long jumps. If he can make it to that point, Lee believes he will have a better chance of remaining on Bushwacker in time to hear the 8-second buzzer.
Lots of things will have to go his way, but Lee is already envisioning making his dreams a reality.
“I have always ridden bulls where if I can see it in my mind, then I have a pretty good chance of doing it,” he concluded.
Follow Justin Felisko on Twitter @jfelisko.