Sydney Graham and her 7-year-old stallion Dupont First won the Redding Rodeo in May with a 17.28-second run worth $5,960, vaulting from No. 11 to No. 7 in the WPRA world standings.
It wasn’t by accident. Graham had her strategy set before she even pulled onto the rodeo grounds.
“My game plan usually only involves where I need to get him to set up the run from the start,” Graham said. “Jennifer Kalafatic called me and told me it was a side gate. I knew he didn’t mind the side-gate setup. He’d done really well at a few other California rodeos with the same setup. I knew if I could set him up in the middle, he would take care of me the rest of the way.”
He did.
“He walked in like he owned that arena, and never quit running,” Graham said. “He gives me a chance every single time.”
The 1,300-pound sorrel by Duponte and out of First Fervor by First Down Dash was purchased by Graham at the Rosi Select Yearling Sale in Guthrie, Oklahoma, during the COVID pandemic. Owned by Run Away Ranch and bred by Bobby Cox, Trump came on slowly but consistently, then broke out to the public eye when he banked over $50,000 at the 2025 Ruby Buckle East and carried Graham into 2026 as her full-time ProRodeo horse. The Abilene, Texas, cowgirl sits at $41,778.28. It didn’t start clean.
“We struggled with a few drug barrels at the beginning of the year, which cost us a lot of money,” Graham said. “So winning Redding is a huge step to our end goal.”
“I’ll never get over winning on Trump. He is so special, and I take every run as a gift from God.”
Sydney Graham
She’ll get to the ego in a minute. First, the fearless part.
“I believe Trump has a lot of great qualities. His best being how confident and fearless he is,” Graham said. “Being on the back of something like that is truly life changing. He walks flat footed into every arena, even ones like Redding, and will blow the doors off the place once I give him the green light. I can’t say it enough, but he is so special. Everyone chases having a horse like him at least once in their life.”
Then there’s the ego.
“Trump loves attention. He truly thinks everyone came to see him. His ego is through the roof right now,” Graham said.
“(Dupont First) deserves to be seen. He is a true winner. I’m honored to be his person and help voice him.”
Sydney Graham
PRCA Announcer of the Year Anthony Lucia put it best after her run earlier this season in Thermal, California: “If that horse could talk, he’d say he’s the best barrel horse that ever lived.”
Graham doesn’t disagree. “He’s not wrong. Trump truly believes he’s the best. And I don’t go a day without telling him that.”
The Redding paycheck pushed Graham up an aggressive four places in the tightly-packed WPRA World race. She’s middle of the pack at No. 7 and a topic of NFR conversation, but there’s still four months and change left on the calendar to go. Graham isn’t watching the board just yet.
“My main focus is picking the rodeos that pay the best to try to make the least amount of runs on my horse. I want him happy and healthy by the end of it,” Graham said. “My job is to take care of him, so I will do that, and let God do the rest.”
“The main thing I lean on is trusting God. He has a plan for each of us,” Graham said. “Learning not to be disappointed when things go wrong, being thankful when things go right, and being able to just go with the flow has helped me a ton. I spend every day just taking care of Trump and making him happy, and God will do the rest.”
The stallion business is moving faster than the breeding shed can keep up, so the priority remains keeping Trump happy over hard rodeo goals.
The public has started noticing the sorrel powerhouse as of late, and Graham has loved watching his following grow.
“Campaigning a stallion like Trump is pretty easy as he speaks for himself. The proof is in the pudding,” Graham said. “There has been challenges that we are learning from this year. I never knew he would take off like he has, so we are doing a lot of catching up… but I love that he’s finally getting the following he deserves. It’s honestly been pretty overwhelming, but I’m trying to enjoy every moment of it.
“My goal this year was to show the world that it doesn’t matter who you are, you can do it. I feel like Trump has done a lot of inspiring this year,” she said. “I love that big sorrel boy.”