Barrel racing is all about speed.

Riders — announcers usually refer to them as cowgirls — enter the arena at full speed, coax their horses around three barrels set up in a cloverleaf shape then gallop furiously back to the starting point, all in about 17 seconds.

As a child, Dean owned a horse in Decatur, Ga., but lost interest when she came to Georgia Tech. She had no interest in riding for almost 28 years, then seven years ago she noticed some horses stabled near her office.

"I don't know if it was midlife crisis or what," Dean said, "but I was divorced and my children were growing up, so I decided to start riding again."

She began trail riding in the desert and met Curtis Fitzgerald, a professional farrier she later married.

"Curtis suggested I try barrel racing," she said. "I just laughed because I thought it was kind of a pansy sport. He dared me to try it."

She was hooked after the first ride.

"It's such an adrenaline rush blasting out of the gate at almost 30 miles per hour," she said. "It requires a lot of trust between horse and rider to cut as close to the barrel as possible while going as fast as possible. Riders are timed down to a thousandth of a second, so you have to trust your horse to keep you safe."

Dean has been injured several times, including a broken foot and a broken leg.