What a tragedy! The whole country is mourning the passing.

By the time the sun fully rose over that Chilton pasture, the life of a young rodeo star had been irreversibly broken. Ace Patton Ashford, fresh out of high school and already a junior rodeo champion, had gone out that morning to do what he’d done his whole life: care for animals, work hard, and chase the future he was building in the arena. When the nearby horse spooked and his leg became tangled, the violent dragging left him with catastrophic head injuries that even a rapid airlift to Baylor Scott & White couldn’t overcome.