The Boyd Polhamus Experience

SAN ANGELO, TX — Rodeo announcer Boyd Polhamus worked his first San Angelo Rodeo in 2000. Since then, he led the team including the board members, volunteers and vendors to the San Angelo Stock Show and Rodeo Association to transform the arena performances making it a truly modern show.

His model, he said, was incorporating the excitement in a new kind of rodeo format inaugurated by the infamous Bad Company Rodeo in the 1990s. The ingredients are contemporary music, lasers, smoke, and pyro. Boyd’s narration of each rodeo performance also places the spectator first, informing them of why each ride or roping — or the performer — is important to the sport.

Polhamus arrived in Texas in the mid-1980s while on a rodeo athlete scholarship at a Wisconsin college where he competed at a college rodeo in Uvalde. He said his coaches discovered that his real talent was in announcing rodeos, which is also a competitive category of the PRCA. Mack Altizer, who was the owner of Bad Company Rodeo and stock contractor for those college rodeos, encouraged Polhamus to get his PRCA card and pursue rodeo announcing professionally.

The rest is history. He cut his teeth on the Bad Company Rodeo circuit, including the world-renown George Paul Memorial Bull Riding stand-alone bull riding event in Del Rio. But soon, the PRCA came calling. He has served on the announcer podium at the NFR 26 times. Plus, he served a year as Production Manager of the NFR, and a year as General Manager of Production of the same event. He has announced RodeoHouston for 28 years, along with other prestigious rodeos like the National Western in Denver, the Calgary Stampede, the Dodge City Round Up, and the Snake River Stampede.

But San Angelo is special, the announcer on horseback said. Since arriving here at the age of 35, he said he has worked with the finest group of rodeo volunteers in his career.

In the video above, Polhamus talks about the history of the San Angelo Rodeo, its future, and why San Angelo is special. This video is brought to you by Angelo MRI.