5 Things South Dakota Locals Do at a Rodeo That Visitors Find Fascinating

Anyone can put on boots and find a seat in the grandstand.

Knowing where to be, what deserves the loudest cheer, and which moments matter most is what separates a South Dakota rodeo regular from a visitor.

These are the things South Dakota locals do at a rodeo that visitors find fascinating.

1. Turning Out for the Days of ’76 Parade

Deadwood’s Main Street turns into South Dakota’s biggest rodeo-week draw hours before the evening show, and locals treat the Days of ’76 parade itself as the headliner.

Deadwood’s Days of ’76 Museum keeps more than 50 horse-drawn wagons, carriages, and stagecoaches in its working collection.

More than half of them roll down Main Street in the parade every year.

The vehicles are the genuine article. The museum dates them to 1875 through 1910, still hitched up and driven instead of parked behind glass.

The rodeo runs nightly for a full week each July, and the parades run on the week’s final two afternoons while rodeo performances continue those same evenings.

It’s never the finale.

2. Cheering for a Hometown Rodeo Queen

In Belle Fourche, South Dakota locals fill the stands every summer to watch a hometown teenager compete for a crown.

A hometown crowd already knows which contestant grew up two miles down the road.

The Black Hills Roundup runs its Miss Rodeo South Dakota contest alongside four nights of Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (PRCA) rodeo each summer.

Horsemanship, rodeo knowledge, interviews, and speeches carry as much weight with the judges as how a contestant looks in the saddle.

The same Miss Rodeo South Dakota title decided in Belle Fourche each summer carried its most recent holder to the national stage.

Callie Mueller, of Florence, won the Miss Rodeo America crown in December 2024.

That crown means something.

3. Catching the Rodeo’s Free Slack Rounds

Days of ’76 in Deadwood runs a whole free rodeo before the ticketed one ever starts, and South Dakota locals build it into their week.

Slack is the overflow round, extra ropers and racers working through the same events under the same rules, hours ahead of the paid seats filling up.

In 2026, steer roping and women’s breakaway and barrel-racing slack all ran free and open to the public, days before the ticketed performances began.

Visitors who show up only for the ticketed evening show never learn slack exists, so they miss real, elite-level roping and racing with no bleacher crowd and no cover charge.

It’s rodeo with nobody watching.

4. Filling the Grandstand for the Ranch Rodeo

South Dakota locals pack the grandstand for an event many out-of-state visitors have never heard of: The Ranch Rodeo.

The competitors punch cattle for a living the other 51 weeks of the year.

The events come straight off a ranch’s to-do list: Trailer loading, branding, and doctoring a stray.

The Black Hills Stock Show’s Ranch Rodeo alone draws 36 teams from a five-state region, and every roster is stacked with working ranchers.

Winners take home custom saddles and Pendleton jackets, not belt buckles.

The Black Hills Roundup runs a Ranch Rodeo, too, with a barbecue on the side.

There’s no fringe here.

5. Signing Toddlers up for Mutton Bustin’

South Dakota parents line up before the gates even open to sign toddlers up for Mutton Bustin’, the pint-size cousin of bronc riding.

The Central States Fair in Rapid City caps it at the first 12 riders, ages 3 to 6 and 60 pounds or less, and the $10 entry fills up fast.

Mutton Bustin’ runs on the same eight-second clock that decides a grown man’s bronc score.

Rodeo families treat it as a kid’s actual first rodeo event.

A crowd that’s watched a hundred grown men hit the dirt loses its mind over a three-year-old.

Nobody boos a fall.

Rodeo, South Dakota’s Official State Sport

South Dakota’s legislature turned rodeo from a pastime into law.

House Bill 1075 designated rodeo as South Dakota’s official sport in 2003, and Pierre made it law with one sentence.

Nobody put it to a statewide vote.

A handful of lawmakers decided.

Thousands in Belle Fourche for Roundup Week

Black Hills Roundup week turns Belle Fourche's population upside down, and locals aren't the only ones who notice.

The town holds about 6,000 people on an ordinary week.

The roundup's parade alone pulls in an estimated 10,000 to 15,000 people.

Every motel within thirty miles books out early.

Half the county's spare bedrooms fill up too.

There's no room left.