One leg in the chute, one out, Scooter Engelhaupt, the 42-year-old bull rider wearing the pink, flowery shirt, waits for his turn to bound the 2,000-pound behemoth.

Though the Ashland native’s got more than two decades of riding experience under his hat, this will be his first time on a bull in four years.

He retired, or so he thought, after his second shoulder surgery. He’s also broken his nose, a hand, an ankle and just about every rib at one time or another. “They told me last time there’s nothing left to fix,” he says. “But I’m pretty lucky. I’m still walking, talking, moving around.”

Scooter’s the biggest, oldest, baldest, goatee-est competitor at the Extreme Bull Riding event in Lincoln on this Friday night — he even jokes that most of the other guys here are younger than his son. He was winning rodeos before some of them could chew solid foods. 

He decided about a year ago that he wanted to get back in the sport and that this tour would be an ideal arena for his comeback. So he lost about 40 pounds, got back in riding shape.

But he hasn’t even been on a practice bull up to this moment. He didn’t want to waste a good score on  a practice spin. 

“I’m hoping for the best, just a good showing,” Scooter says. “I hope I can just make it past the end of the chute gate. All you can do is crawl down in there, big old smile, nod your face and away you go.”

They blare his name. Scooter drops onto his adversary. The gate fires open, and his bull shotguns out, cracking one-two-three almighty bucks.

Scooter looks like he’ll make it the whole 8 seconds, but he bails out after a few, ending too soon to be scored or make it to the next round. But Scooter lands on his feet.

And he wasn’t here for the win.

He strides out of the arena, euphoric, jittery, tall. “For the record,” he hollers, “that felt damn pretty good. I think I’ll do it again.”

Micah Mertes can be reached at mmertes@journalstar.com or 473-7395.