Wrangler BFI Week, anchored by the 46th annual Bob Feist Invitational Team Roping on April 1, paid out a record $3.88 million to ropers and drew more than 2,000 teams. The event, running March 29 through April 4, was comprised of 13 separate ropings over seven days in Guthrie, Oklahoma’s Lazy E Arena. Aired live on the Wrangler Network, 112,000 viewers at home watched more than 3.3 million minutes of team roping.
Curry Kirchner and Tyson Thompson had the biggest day of their young roping careers at the 46th annual Bob Feist Invitational Team Roping Classic, and thanks to the unprecedented 100% 2023 payback have a record $160,000 to show for it. Kirchner, 24, and Thompson, 25, roped six steers in 45.38 seconds to take center stage at the fabulous Lazy E Arena in Guthrie, Oklahoma at BFI’s end on April 1. After braving the BFI marathon, both were borderline speechless.
“The BFI is the biggest roping there is,” said Kirchner, 24, who works alongside his dad, Robert, at Myrl Mortenson’s cattle operation about an hour and 15 minutes northwest of Guthrie in Ames, Oklahoma. “To just be able to compete in this roping is great. To even think about winning it is crazy.
It took 10 gold heading buckles to win the inaugural BFI Legends Roping, and Speed Williams and Matt Sherwood were the over-40 guys who brought their best game to the world-famous Lazy E Arena on April 1 to get it done. Eight-time champ of the world Williams, 54, headed for two-time world heading titlist Sherwood, 52, as one of 34 teams entered that treated the crowd to a sweet real-time walk down memory lane.
“Are you kidding me, I won $20,000 for roping with Speed Williams?” Sherwood grinned at roping’s end. “I’ve never run a steer with the best header in the world ever to live. To be able to keep my composure and do my job is very rewarding to me personally. What a fun situation to find myself in.”
When you’re hot, you’re hot. Arizona’s James Arviso and Oklahoma’s Landen Glenn haven’t had many chances to rope together yet in their young careers. But the 18-year-old high school seniors have already found chemistry, and the ability to come through in the clutch and close the deal when it really counts. Coming from third high call, Arviso and Glenn roped four steers in 32.93 seconds and struck for the $25,000 win Thursday at the 2022 Hooey Jr BFI Open at the world-famous Lazy E Arena in Guthrie, Oklahoma.
If Arviso’s shy grin and humble words seem familiar, it’s because he’s cut from the same cloth as his Uncle Derrick Begay. James is the son of Derrick’s sister, Jamie, and her husband, John Arviso.
On the 45th anniversary, former BFI contenders invited back
Team roping fans with the Bob Feist Invitational on their must-watch bucket list have one more reason to catch the 2022 edition this spring. The day before the 45th anniversary of Bob Feist’s original Open roping – Wrangler BFI XLV presented by Yeti on April 2 – organizers are adding a new roping called BFI Legends.
At the Charlie 1 Horse All-Girl Challenge Team Roping on March 17 in Guthrie’s Lazy E Arena, Hall-of-Fame cowgirl Lari Dee Guy won first with Annette Stahl and second with last year’s champ, Whitney DeSalvo, to take home $28,375 to Abilene, Texas.
The event is part of Wrangler BFI Week presented by Yeti, which kicked off on March 14 with the 44th Bob Feist Invitational (BFI) for the pros. Annually the richest all-female team roping in the country, this year’s Charlie 1 Horse Challenge fielded 229 teams from across the country, up from 184 teams last year.
For the second straight year, former world champion bull rider Mike White and his wife, Hannah, of DeKalb, Texas, roped their way to a six-figure win in the #12.5 Oil Field Showdown on Monday at Wrangler BFI Week presented by Yeti in Guthrie, Oklahoma.
Anchored by the 44th Annual Bob Feist Invitational for professionals on March 14, the five-day event includes eight affiliated amateur ropings and was held because of pandemic restrictions for the second time in Guthrie’s Lazy E Arena.
Fans watched the greatest jackpot team roper in history extend his record of wins and break the all-time earnings record at the world’s richest pro roping Sunday night in Oklahoma.
Kory Koontz, 49, of Stephenville, Texas, clinched victory at the Wrangler Bob Feist Invitational (BFI) presented by Yeti for the record third time, riding a horse he raised and nursed back to health after a horrific auto accident a year ago. Exactly 25 years after Koontz won back-to-back BFI titles with Rube Woolsey and Matt Tyler, he and Manny Egusquiza Jr. roped six steers in 46.48 seconds to earn $150,000 cash and epic prizes.
“Gunners” – or the first team out at the 44th edition of the Bob Feist Invitational (BFI) on March 14 – will be two of the wiliest veterans in the game. Not only has each man already won the BFI, but each has also ridden at least one horse awarded as the best of the event. Hall-of-Famer J.D. Yates, a 21-time NFR roper who won the BFI in 2010 with Jay Wadhams, will turn the first steer for eight-time NFR heeler Cody Cowden, who won “the Feist” in 1997 with Bobby Hurley.
In the same arena last year as the BFI and just a couple of days after it, Whitney DeSalvo of Wilmar, Arkansas, hammered 11 of 12 steers on the second hop in the Charlie 1 Horse All-Girl in Guthrie, Oklahoma – and if her mare, Becky, hadn’t bucked on the first one, she’d surely have batted a thousand.
At the Charlie 1 Horse All-Girl Challenge Team Roping on June 24, Whitney DeSalvo of Springfield, Arkansas, left no doubt about her status as the world’s best female heeler.
DeSalvo, just 25, took the top three placings with three different partners to haul a staggering $28,875 in cash back to Arkansas plus a truckload of prizes. The three-time WPRA world champion won the roping with Hope Thompson of Abilene, Texas, who raked in $20,750 total.
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