Welcome to Beyond the Ring. I'm Dale Hummel, serving as your co-star alongside Ryan Rash.

Hi, boy, hi.

Those of you listening, I assume, have a connection to the stock show industry.

And with that, I don't think there's probably much need for an introduction of Ryan Rash,

but we have had a lot of inquiries about how did we come together with this project

and how did we decide to co-host the behind the ring educational podcast.

On my end, it's simple. The respect that I have for Ryan when he comes into a more traditional

minded industry as himself, not afraid of the challenges that are going to be put forth out there

and addressing them head on has gained a lot of respect

for me. I appreciate that very much about Ryan. If I go back in time here, I guess that the first

introduction that had to Ryan was when he was showing as a youth in the Stock Show world and the majors

in Texas. And then he reappeared again during his senior college livestock judging career at Texas A&M

and obviously a very dominating individual in those ranks.

A few years had passed, and Ryan comes back on the scene as a livestock judge serving multiple

species across the country.

This is when it hit me, I guess, the hardest that his

abilities and is, in my mind, consistency to sort livestock and discuss structural correctness and

do it accurately and do it with some professionalism combined with the overwhelming youth support

that he has or youth interest to show underneath him hit me extremely hard. At that point, in my mind, it's simple. It seems like it's the logical place to go for somebody that wants to hire a youth livestock judge, and Ryan's been out there judging shows across the country. He makes it a well-known fact that he's happy to judge any show

in the country, provided it comes close to covering its expenses and fits into his calendar. And that's

impressive, kind of unparalleled. There's not a lot of people out there willing to do that.

Ryan and I have been friends for several years. We do have contrasting personalities and lifestyles, yet we share a common

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