Ep. 69 - Broadcasting & Barrel Racing with Janie Johnson
We’ve mentioned Janie Johnson on all three seasons of the That Western Life, which may come across a bit creepy, but just goes to show how big of a fans we all are from the podcast! Janie is fresh off of RFD-TV’s The American, a crazy week full of tailgate parties, performances and exciting story lines, so we were excited to chat with her more about all things pro rodeo!
Early Years
Growing up in Canyon, Texas, which is just outside of Amarillo and the definition of “west Texas.” Despite growing up on a ranch, Janie wanted to be a superstar or Disney channel star like Hillary Duff in Lizzie McGuire. It wasn’t until her teen years that she fully got into horses and rodeo, even though she had been riding her whole life.
Janie’s dad was a four-time world champion saddle bronc rider, and was an all-around likeable and joyful man. In hindsight, Janie appreciates horses and family so much more than she ever did in the time. Horses, animals and the land, looking back, shaped her and she feels lucky to have had the childhood that she had.
Shaping A Career From A Young Age
“When I was a kid, my dad was the chute boss at the Calgary Stampede so we would make the long trip to Canada every summer to rodeo,” says Janie. “Something that was important to my parents when we went to rodeos and the NFR, was that they … always encouraged me to be polite, get to know people, and speak to their friends.”
This includes rodeo legends like Bob Tallman, someone who is as cool as can be. At Calgary every year, around the biggest names in rodeo, that is where she learned to communicate and speak to rodeo personnel and athletes. At the time, Janie just thought she was falling in love with rodeo and didn’t realize it was shaping her future career.
“I didn’t realize they were big names people at the time, it was just me being forced out of my shell.”
Embrace What Makes You Uncomfortable
Janie’s parents never pushed rodeo on her and instead of doing junior rodeo full time she did acting, ballet, theater. All of these components have helped her in her career to give her a comfort level in front of the camera and microphone today as a broadcast personality.
“It’s great that your parents let you do what you wanted and then it brought you back home,” says co-host Rachel Owens-Sarno.
“I never slow down, I signed up for so many activities,” says Janie with a laugh. “I did pole vault, tennis, ballet, acting - I don’t know how [my mom] did it!”
Rodeo Roots
Janie’s path to her current job is extremely unusual and started when she left high school, heading to the University of Texas. Her entire life, UT had been her dream school as the big school in Texas and had a great film program. It’s also the least rodeo and western of all the Texas schools.
“I was a regular film tv broadcast major, I didn’t do any broadcasting and I only did film production and film critic courses,” says Janie who wasn't planning on rodeoing in college. But when her parents told her that she “couldn’t just have a horse to have a horse,” so she became an independent rodeo competitor.
“They called me the ‘Lone Longhorn,’” says Janie with a laugh who even had to make her own vest! “It was fun and I loved it!”
And it was in that moment that she started realizing that she didn’t want to leave rodeo and so she needed to find a way to combine those two things. The only option, at the time, was the National Finals Rodeo, but that was it.
For her final project, she asked her dad who she could interview for rodeo and film - he suggested his friend, Jeff Medders. Janie had to research who he was - that was seven years ago and now he’s Janie’s boss.
“If you’re ever in Tulsa, come visit me!” Said Jeff about their headquarters. It just so happened that a few months later Janie ran barrels at a pro rodeo nearby and swung by Jeff’s studios, where he encouraged her to come “hang out” at the NFR for an internship. As the time rolled around, Jeff didn’t return her phone calls.
“Dad, I don’t think I have an internship,” Janie recounts.
“You just need to show up!” Was her Dad’s advice so that’s what Janie did and nobody was expecting her. Jeff got her a credential and she became the coffee grabber, odds and ends projects, etc.
The next year, the long time associate producer of the NFR, Haley Ohr, decided to step away from television and when Jeff asked who they could get for the position, she mentioned, “I had an intern last year that followed me around?”
That person was Janie Johnson and she got the call, the first year out of college, to step up to the role of associate producer of the NFR. Excited and mildly terrified, she picked Haley’s brain prior to the event. For the event she had to get contacts of all the contestants, do the interviews, grab sound bites, create fun features like roller coasters with the contestants, and then, during the rodeo, she was Kadee Coffman’s associate producer.
“Kadee is wonderful and I just love her, she works so hard! We’d chat about questions, she’d ask me to wrangle people, and we’d create questions… we were a team!” Says Janie about the experience in the role of associate producer of the NFR which she held for the first five years out of college. Keep in mind, however, that that was just two weeks out of the year and she had to find herself and jobs for the remainder of the year.
“Jeff always shows up for you, it may take a bit because he’s so busy,” says Janie. “He was willing to give me the job, but I had to work for it and prove that I wanted it.”
Will you ever return to the film world?
With the booming western industry in the film world right now, especially with shows like Taylor Sheridan’s Yellowstone on Paramount, Janie has been thinking more about going back to the film industry in the future to be a part of this big movement.
“I don’t even know where I would go about it,” says Janie who did a lot of film coursework at UT. Fun fact, she also was in a Netflix film in college, but won’t disclose the title. “I would be interested in getting into it some way, but I am dramatically lacking in the film industry now that I’ve gone into the broadcasting world.”
Once, at the Steiner’s Rig’n’Rally ranch shortly after the pandemic first started the shutdown in May of 2020, she ran into Taylor Sheridan and didn’t realize it was the creative mastermind and producer behind Yellowstone. Sheridan was with some cutting horse friends of theirs and she was introduced, once again, by her parents.
“How cool was it to meet Taylor Sheridan?” Asked her mom that night.
“Ummm… what?!” She asked, completely unaware that their entire hair and make-up team, production team and more was at the event as they are all friends with the Steiner’s and wanted to check out the event.
Janie the Steer Wrestling Hazer
Running into Jeff at the Texas Cowboys Hall of Fame dinner he asked Janie if she had ever been on camera. Despite the fact that she had long thought about it, but was very aware of her lack of experience on camera, was shy about sharing that it was a hope with Jeff. For her first event, Janie went to the Junior High Rodeo Finals and felt like everything was just going awful.
“This is the lamest thing ever, we need to showcase these kids and the personality that they have,” the production guys advised.
“Well, there is a Splash Day?” Suggested Janie who was rocking her t-shirt, shorts, floaties, and participated with the kids in the water day … and may have been super excited! Then followed the ribbon roping videos, which showed the adrenaline and energy of the kids.
“it was so great! So we went nuts and started going to everything from cook outs to water fights,” said Janie. Then she was told she had to do a sponsor highlight for a jackpot steer wrestling and so, in an effort to make it unique, Janie got on a horse, learned how to haze and started hazing for the guys!
“Those will be some of the best memories of my life but it was also so much work!” Says Janie who learned how to be in front of the camera from the Geronimo camera crew that was with her. They helped her be comfortable, make it fun, and have a blast. The junior high and high school finals that year changed the whole trajectory of her life.
Commentating the 2020 National Finals Rodeo Barrel Racing
Working the Tailgate Party with Kirbe Schnoor and Kadee Coffman, the producer, Matt Schultz, texted Janie at 4:00 pm on Round 4 night and asked if she could be on standby to commentate the barrels.
“I was in the middle of a live tailgate show… I leave a bit early to do my interviews for Western Sports Round Up and I had somebody drive me for the 20 minute drive so I can prep for barrels,” says Janie. Joe Beaver was doing tie-down commentating and Janie is standing there, unsure of if she’s doing the barrels or not. Joe was sure either so she reached out and asked if she was needed and the response? “Get mic’d up - you’re going on!”
One of the things that’s really cool about Janie commentating the barrel racing is that she’s also a competitor and has competed against many of the competitors that she color broadcasts for!
“I wouldn’t say that I am qualified for the job, but I hope that people liked it. I think Joe B. did amazing but that’s not his passion in life, … so getting to have a woman commentate that, it was just awesome!” Says Janie, who also mentioned that you don’t want to see what she looks like when she commentates the barrels because she gets so excited that she’s almost tackling the camera with excitement!
“Every single one of those barrel racers are competitive, their horses are amazing, it’s just amazing!”
Since working for the Cowboy Channel, Janie feels completely engulfed with rodeo, and has found herself becoming an even more intense rodeo fan! Pre-Cowboy Channel though, is one of her biggest moments when she got to do the Extreme Broncs Finale in South Dakota with CBS Sports and Geronimo Productions. Something that people may not know about Janie is that, maybe even bigger than being a barrel racing fan, she’s a huge saddle bronc fan!
“It was my first real adult broadcast job, not a dig on junior high or high school rodeo, but it was just real rodeo,” says Janie, whose family is from South Dakota and were all there for the sold out crowd and inaugural event.
“I am so biased to the rough stock end of the rodeo and barrel racing,” says Janie who also worked for the PBR for a while. “It’s the adrenaline of it, I guess? Or the ‘putting your life on the line’ part.”
Barrel Racing
Janie has the challenge of balancing commentating events and her career, while also chasing her barrel racing dreams. As we’ve seen though, Janie’s tenacious and will do what she needs to do to make it happen - just like she did in college. In fact, once she ran back and forth between sideline reporting and jumping on her own horse to run!
Currently her horses are getting some time off and while she’s been juggling the thought of sending them to other prorodeo competitors to ride, she also feels that a shift is coming and can see a future where she can keep her competitor barrel racer dreams alive! And now, for the first time in her prorodeo career, both of her check-winning prorodeo horses are sound!
Additionally, she has one nice gelding that is three-years post kissing spine surgery and is running really well. Janie is very excited to have this horse back and shares the unique story about diagnosing kissing spine, doing the surgery and the long road to recovery. Her vet actually said that it was one of the most severe cases that he had ever seen with bones overlapping - in fact, they had to cut six different sections. He’s now healthy, happy and has outran her other horses in the last five runs.
“It took several years of me really babying after the surgery because he was so blown up from being run with his back problem,” says Janie. If you are interested in learning more about Kissing Spine Surgeries, we chatted about it on our myth-busting episode with Dr. Jared Sharp, DVM, of Idaho.
