There are some women in Western sports whose impact cannot be measured by records, titles or time spent in an arena.

Their influence is quieter than that.

It is found in the prayers before the rodeo starts. In the steady hand behind a dream. In the faith that holds families together through triumph and tragedy. In the kind of love that keeps showing up, even when the spotlight is pointed somewhere else.

For decades, Elsie Frost has been one of those women.

Known by many simply as “Miss Elsie,” Frost is a mother of three, a grandmother and the mother of the late great Lane Frost. She will be honored with the PBR Sharon Shoulders Award, an honor created in 2010 to recognize the great women of professional bull riding whose work, partnership and faith have been as integral to the sport as the athletes themselves.

Named for Sharon Shoulders, the wife of legendary cowboy Jim Shoulders, the award honors women whose loyalty, strength and faith helped shape Western sports from behind the scenes. For Frost, the connection is personal. Her husband, Clyde Frost, rodeoed in the same era as Jim, and both men competed at the first National Finals Rodeo, giving Frost a deep appreciation for the other wives and women whose steadfast support helped carry their families, their husbands and the sport forward.

For Frost, receiving it still does not feel real.

“It was almost unbelievable,” Frost said. “I’m like, ‘No, it can’t be me.’”

Even when discussing one of the highest honors a woman in Western sports can receive, Frost’s first instinct was not to talk about herself. It was to talk about Sharon.

“I just think about Sharon, what a wonderful person she was, and how she lived, and her faith,” Frost said. “Sharon was such a good wife and mother and Christian, and those three things are very important to me.”

That is Elsie Frost.

Even as the honor now bears her name, her instinct is to turn the attention toward those who shaped the path before her.

To Sharon Shoulders, whose legacy gave the award its name and purpose. To Lane, whose story she has never stopped telling. To the rodeo community that has loved her family so deeply. And above all, to God, whose hand she sees in every piece of it.

“I just don’t feel like I belong in that group at all,” Frost said. “But I’m thrilled to get it. It’s just such an honor.”

That humility is part of what makes Elsie Frost truly one of a kind.

Most of the world knows her as Lane Frost’s mother. It remembers Lane as a World Champion bull rider, a beloved figure whose smile, talent and story continue to inspire generations. It remembers the tragedy of Cheyenne Frontier Days in 1989, when Lane was killed at just 25 years old.

But Elsie Frost has spent the decades since making sure people know more than the tragedy.

She has spent them making sure people know the truth.

Lane, she says, was more than the champion people saw in the arena. He was a man of faith.

“When I went to a cowboy church, I just told Lane’s story and told about him being saved,” Frost said. “The movie didn’t tell that Lane was a born-again Christian.”

For Frost, that missing piece mattered. And for years, she carried Lane’s story into cowboy churches, sharing his rides, his life and the faith that became central to who he was before his death.

What began as a mother’s desire to tell the real story of her son became something much larger.

It became a ministry.

It became more than 400,000 cowboy Bibles distributed in Lane’s memory.

And like most pieces of Frost’s life, she does not tell that story as something she built herself. She tells it as something God placed in motion.

The idea started when a cowboy church near Houston had cowboy Bibles printed in Lane’s memory. When those ran out, there was some hesitation from others about whether people might pick one up only because Lane’s name was on it.

Frost saw it differently.

“I don’t care why they pick it up, as long as they’ll pick up the Bible,” Frost said.

Still, she hesitated. At the time, she and her daughter were running a convenience store, their days already full with customers, long hours and the steady demands of keeping a business going. She did not feel like she had the time or the money to take on something that big.

Then a friend stopped by.

“She said, ‘I’ve got some money here that I don’t have a church to tithe to right now, so I want to give it to you,’” Frost recalled.

The amount was exactly what Frost needed to order the first batch of 700 Bibles.

“I thought, ‘Okay, God, I guess you’re trying to tell me something,’” Frost said.

From there, the orders grew. Seven hundred became 1,000. Then 2,000. Eventually, they were ordering 10,000 at a time.

Frost still remembers the uncertainty of those early orders. She did not always have the money upfront. She just kept trusting that if God wanted the work done, He would provide a way.

“A lot of times I would just think, ‘I’m not going to have the money to pay for them this time,’” Frost said. “But by the time I had to pay the bill, there’d be just enough money in there to take care of it.”

She pauses at the memory, still giving credit away from herself.

“I did not have the money. I did not have the time,” Frost said. “I just didn’t think I had the ability to do that. But with God, all things are possible.”

That conviction has carried Frost through the hardest seasons of her life.

When the movie “8 Seconds” brought Lane’s story to a wider audience, it also forced Elsie Frost to relive some of the worst days of motherhood and of her life. While the film introduced countless new fans to bull riding and helped carry Lane’s name to a new generation, Frost has been honest that parts of the process were deeply painful.

Most of all, she wished it had shown Lane’s faith.

During the process, there were moments when the weight of it all became too much to carry inside. Upset during the filming process, Frost stepped away from the noise and cameras, walked out behind the barn and broke down in prayer, crying out in the quiet place where grief, faith and cowboys met.

“I did a lot of praying,” Frost said.

Behind that barn, away from the cameras and the noise of Hollywood, she felt her answer.

“I just felt like God said everybody’s here for a reason,” Frost said.

So she trusted.

She prayed for the people involved in the film. She and her family even gave the director a Bible. And although she did not understand every part of the process at the time, she came to believe that God could use even the imperfect parts of the movie for something greater.

“You just never know,” Frost said. “We just plant the seeds. God does the harvest.”

That has been the rhythm of her life.

Plant the seed.

Tell the story.

Hand out the Bible.

Point people toward faith.

Let God handle the rest.

Even now, more than three decades after Lane’s death, Frost remains amazed by how strongly his story continues to resonate. Young riders still know his name. Parents still name their sons Lane. Fans still approach the Frost family with stories of how Lane impacted them.

“When Lane died, I asked Clyde, ‘Do you think in 10 years anybody will remember Lane?’” Frost said. “Boy, was that an understatement.”

She knows the movie played a role in keeping Lane’s name alive. She knows his success in the arena made him unforgettable. But to Frost, the lasting reach of his story has always been something deeper.

“Only God could have used that movie the way He has,” Frost said. “People know about Lane because of it.”

And she believes Lane would be grateful.

“He would be thrilled,” Frost said, remembering how Lane once dreamed out loud about a movie that would tell both his story and Reba McEntire’s. “He said, ‘I don’t mean me and her together, I just mean tell her story and tell my story in a movie. Wouldn’t that be neat?’”

In a way, that dream came true far beyond what any of them could have imagined. Lane’s story did make it to the screen, and it carried his name to people who may never have watched a bull ride otherwise. That continued love for Lane is a blessing to Frost, but it is not something she has ever tried to hold for herself. Her purpose has never been fame, recognition or praise. It has been service.

That is why the Sharon Shoulders Award fits her so well, even if she is the last person who would say so.

The award honors women who strengthen Western sports not by seeking attention, but by building the foundation beneath it. Women who pray, encourage, sacrifice and stand firm. Women whose faith and devotion become part of the sport’s heartbeat.

Frost has done that for decades.

Not loudly.

Not for recognition.

But faithfully.

She remains grateful that rodeo and Western sports continue to make room for faith. She is proud that rodeos open with prayer and the national anthem. She is thankful that so many bull riders today still carry their faith with them into the arena.

“I’m just so thrilled that every rodeo opens with a prayer and the national anthem. I don’t know another sport that does that.”

For Frost, that tradition matters because it reflects the Western way of life she has always known — one built on faith, family and gratitude.

And when people hear her name connected to the Sharon Shoulders Award, she already knows what she hopes they remember.

Not her.

Sharon.

“Most of all, I want them to think about Sharon and all that she did for rodeo,” Frost said.

It was the Elsie Frost answer.

Presented with an award honoring her own life of faith and service, she once again turned the spotlight away from herself.

But for those who know her story, that is exactly why she belongs.

Because Elsie Frost has never needed the spotlight to leave a legacy.

She has built one through faith. Through humility. Through quiet conviction.

Through every Bible handed out, every prayer spoken, every seed planted and every life touched by the story she never stopped telling.

She is a mother, a grandmother and above all else, a Christian.

And Lane was too.

Photo courtesy of Bull Stock Media