Just two months ago, Robin Montague was riding high after a successful trip to Nevada for the Laughlin River Stampede and the Clark County Fair and Rodeo in Logandale. Montague made the trip West by herself from her Bandera, Texas, home, and spent Easter weekend with her new rodeo family-members of the Laughlin rodeo committee, the stock contractor Roy Honeycutt and crew, and valiant 7-year-old Lauren Terry, who they were raising money for in her battle against leukemia.

"I feel like a band of angels are following me," Montague told family friends. "I've met so many great people, and my life has been deeply touched. What's gone on in the arena has been so great, but what's outside of it is just a blessing. I'm living a dream."

Montague and her talented Jody O Toole gelding Chief Lil Tee headed West again in June. She placed at Sisters, Ore., and won Union, Ore. She had cracked the Top 15 and momentum was on her side as she headed to Pleasant Grove, Utah, before her planned decent to Reno.

Then in an instant Montague's NFR dreams were torn asunder by an unidentified hazer, ponying a dogging horse. As the hazer loped by Montague in the warm-up pen in Pleasant Grove, the flopping stirrup on the dogging horse caught her right foot breaking her fibula at the ankle.

"It was like I was involved in a hit-and-run," said Montague. "Shelley Morgan was yelling at the top of her lungs but the guy kept loping."

The tough cowgirl that Montague is loaded her horse and made the 9-hour drive to Reno, where she would try to compete and consult with members of the Justin Sports Medicine team. As bad as it was, Montague's angels hadn't left her - a rodeo employee who hailed from San Antonio helped her load her truck and trailer in the early morning, a truck driver noticed her heavily bandaged right leg propped on the dash as he went to pass her and rather than drive off he kept pace with her and watched out for her as long as his journey allowed, and upon arriving in Reno, rodeo committee members from Pleasant Grove called to make sure she arrived safely.

In Reno, she met her friend, Lisa Burney, DVM, who had scheduled a two-week vacation to help Montague with the strenuous Fourth of July run. With Burney's help and graciousness of former NFR qualifier and Nevada resident Lita Scott, Montague made her first run at Reno with the walking cast, which barely fit in her stirrup.

Despite losing that stirrup at the first barrel, her lefty Chief ran within a half-second of the leaders. The Justin team made some modifications to her splint for the night and got clearance from the judges for Montague to run in a tennis shoe. Though a brilliant idea, the execution was less than ideal and Montague hit the third barrel with her injured leg.

Surgery was schedule for the next morning. The goal was to get her back on the NFR trail as soon as possible.

"They told me if they fixed it now, it would be more stable and heal faster," said Montague, who had a plate and seven screws inserted at her ankle. "It was a good thing, because it was worse than it looked on x-rays. It was more unstable than they thought. I was hoping to be back on a horse by tomorrow (four days following surgery), but that's over achieving."

Dr. Travis Kieckbush of Sierra Orthopedics performed the surgery. The father of two rodeo cowgirls was working the Justin crew for the Reno Rodeo and agreed to cover what insurance didn't. Another individual, John Hawkins, who used to live in the Texas Hill Country like Montague, arranged for her to stay the week at the Inn at Renown, near the hospital, for the week.

Montague released out of her scheduled rodeos in Canada. She'd like to be back in the saddle for Cody, Wyo., and Red Lodge, Mont., but Salinas, Calif., is looking more realistic at this point.

"It's hard enough to compete against these girls as it is and being less than 100 percent makes it even more so," said Montague. "I know if I go back home, I won't come back out."

Scott, along with Wilderness Circuit Director Kali Jo Parker's family, has offered to arrange for her to get to wherever she needs to go. The rodeo committee members everywhere she's been have gone out of their way to help.

"Everywhere I've been the committees have been amazing," she said. "People don't realize what happens outside of the arena. They donate their time and give their hearts to us. They make you feel like you're at home when your three states away from home."

Montague continues to be amazed by the number of people who have gone out their way to help her both before and after she broke her fibula.

"My goal is to take it day by day," she said. "It is what is. I've been so blessed to have accomplished what I did."

Note: The 2010 Reno Rodeo will conclude on Saturday night, June 25. Results will be available next week.