FORT WORTH, Texas – As the action got underway for the first-ever Women’s Rodeo World Championship (WRWC) in Fort Worth, Texas, Monday evening at Cowtown Coliseum, heated races for the world championship titles began to unfurl.
Jimmi Jo Montera (Greely, Colorado) currently leads the World All-Around standings with 8,755 points, edging Hope Thompson’s (Abilene, Texas) 8,715 points.
Hope Thompson and Whitney DeSalvo are a time-tested team to be reckoned with. They’re the best of friends, and that chemistry has spilled straight into their super-successful partnership. Thompson and DeSalvo roped four steers in 30.78 seconds to take the $20,000 title at the BFI Charlie 1 Horse All-Girl Team Roping, and daylighted the 174-team field by 7.86 seconds. Thompson and DeSalvo have now won this roping two of the last three years, and were the reserve champs that third year.
Hope and Whitney took a half-second lead over the pack into the short round, and slammed the door with a snappy 7.22-second run.
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.
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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