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Rodeo Chute, Tucson, Arizona, 1998

"Moments from pain, bull rider Brian Smotherman holds on for a last instant before the chute gate opens. In less than eight seconds he'll be down hard on Tucson dirt with a separated shoulder, a casualty of the roughest event in the rough sport of rodeo. Professional rodeos—about a thousand a year—thrive today on romance, nostalgia, and the utter devotion of their hard-driving cowboy stars."

—From "Rodeo: Behind the Chutes," National Geographic magazine, September 1999

Photograph by William Albert Allard