Community
10 November, 2025
Zonta Rodeo Queen Quest gears up for another big year
An information session is being held to round up entrants for the 2026 Zonta Rodeo Queen Quest.
The Zonta Rodeo Queen Quest is back again for 2026, with organisers inviting anyone interested in being an entrant to come along to an information session on Wednesday night.
Co-coordinator Loretta Gladstone, who will again share the duties with Debbie Huddy, said the Zonta Club of Mount Isa was proud to be backing up.
“The first year was a lot about learning, a lot about firsts, a lot about sucking it up and seeing what worked and what didn’t. It worked beautifully,” she said.
“The girls raised a phenomenal amount of money for the community – $211,770 – so they were all amazing. Of course, there can only be two winners, the Charity Queen and the Rodeo Queen, but all of the girls conducted themselves beautifully.”
The positive feedback meant there was never any question of stopping.
“The consensus when we took it to the club and said, 'should we do this again?', was a resounding yes,” Ms Gladstone said.
“So I’m sure we’ll have more helpers from Zonta itself come out this year.”
The service group is also working closely with the Mount Isa Rodeo for next year’s event.
“We’ve had meetings and we’re going to go into this together to make all events even better,” the co-coordinator said.
“We all said that we’ve got to do things a bit better and together this year. I think from both sides we’re going to benefit from the relationship.”
Ms Gladstone said there had already been strong interest in the 2026 Queen Quest.
“We have got some good numbers for registration,” she said.
“We really want the registrations to know how many seats to put out – we don’t want anybody standing around.
"All are welcome to come on the night, even if they haven’t filled out a registration form; we’ll have registrations at the door to get their number and email address.
"But even if you haven’t registered, you’re most welcome. The more the better.”
After tightening a few guidelines and making minor adjustments from last year, Ms Gladstone said organisers were confident of another great campaign.
“We’ve learned a lot and made a few things a bit clearer for the entrants,” she said.
The motivation to do it again was simple.
“The sense of community ... everybody you met in the street thanked us and said thank you so much for bringing this back,” Ms Gladstone said.
“It was really missing. For us, it’s about the girls raising funds for those little charities that really don’t get a lot of exposure. It gives the community events to go to and to support.”
Organisers are hoping to have entrants finalised by early December so fundraising can kick off before Christmas.
Ms Gladstone said Wednesday's session would be held in the Buchanan Park grandstand at 5.30pm.
“We’re looking forward to seeing lots of smiling faces there, listening to what we have to say and, hopefully, we’ll get a full complement of entrants again.”