Cooper Cooke has had another strong season. He is sixth in the world standings as he heads to the National Finals Rodeo for the third consecutive season.
(PHOTO BY LARA ST JACQUES)
VICTOR, Idaho – As a professional bareback rider, Cooper Cooke could stay anywhere he wants.
He chooses to live where he was raised.
“When you walk out your back door and are looking at the face of the Tetons and beautiful mountains, it’s nice and cool and really peaceful,” said Cooke, 24, of Victor. “The only thing you can see are cows, and your closest neighbor is pretty much a mile away. My whole support group’s here, so I don’t really have a reason to leave.”
He resides on his family’s place, which was settled by his grandparents 90 years ago. It’s where he was raised, where he played, where he learned to be a man and a cowboy.
“My grandparents were actually some of the first people to ever come here,” he said. “Growing up, I had these big, awesome mountains in the background. I was hunting and just doing stuff in the mountains. I never really knew what the city life was like until I went to college.
“It’s pretty low-key around here. There’s not really anything to do besides go mess around the mountains or play sports, so I’m pretty fortunate for that.”
It’s what has developed Cooke into one of the elite bareback riders in ProRodeo. He finished the 2026 regular season with $197,971 and will enter his third straight National Finals Rodeo as the No. 6 bareback rider in the world standings. He finished seventh a year ago and 12th in 2024, so each layer of his life is trending upward.
“This might be the year I’m most pumped about,” said Cooke, who credits much of his success to his sponsors, Cinch, Western Rodeo, Serratelli Hats, Jackson Hole Rodeo, Barstow Pro Rodeo Equipment and BLK SPR. “It seems every year I rodeo, everything just gets better and better. I got the first year under my belt, and being there last year made life way easier.
“I think this year is just going to be easier. I’m hoping to make about $200,000-plus out of Vegas.”
The City of Lights has been the NFR’s home since 1985, and it’s where the biggest dollars are paid out over 10 nights, Dec. 3-12. Go-round winners will earn almost $34,000 per night, so the opportunities spread over the course of the championship. A year ago, Cooke pocketed $131,000 in Sin City.
“In my first year, I was 22, and I still really hadn’t matured that much by that time in my life,” he said. “I was still a really small guy … like, I’m one of the smallest bareback riders anyway, but I think learning how to figure out my body and figure out what I need to do to be better on those bigger, stronger horses is big. Over the years, I’ve got it figured out a little bit.”
He’s also built some bulk. Cook estimated he’s gained 15 pounds over the last two seasons. While that may not seem significant to most, it accounts for about 10 percent of his 140-pound body weight. That type of muscular maturity helps in the most physically demanding event in ProRodeo.
The 105 bareback horses selected by the cowboys to perform in Las Vegas will be separated into five pens, from the easiest – the “hopper pen” – to the most difficult – the “eliminator pen,” which pose the greatest fear among the men who ride them. In the middle is a “rank pen,” and the eliminators are a level above that.
“Based on the last two years, the only thing that keeps me from winning a world championship in Las Vegas has been the ‘E pen,’ ” Cooke said. “It’s been my No. 1 priority ever since I started riding. I know if I can get through those two nights of the ‘E pen’ and have two good ‘E pens,’ they’re going to have a pretty hard shot at beating me.”
That’s the confidence that his 24 years have levied upon the Idaho cowboy. It comes from a life spent in the mountains and on the playing field. He competed in most tradition sports as well as rodeo, the third of four children born to Casey and Jacki Cooke. Brother Cade is the oldest, then Libby joined two years later; Cooper is four years younger than her, and Coy is 12 years behind him.
“Every time I run my hand in the riggin’, there’s definitely no doubt in my mind that I’m going to be in the Top 5,” he said. “I think that’s just carrying confidence. I credit my parents for that. If I was a parent, I would do the same things with my kids if that’s what they’re wanting to do. I wrestled, played baseball, basketball, football, soccer. I did every sport when I was young.
“I’ve just been very fortunate to be naturally athletic, but I think having that motivation and that drive through junior high and high school and high school rodeos helped. I did every event: bareback, saddle bronc, bulldogging, calf roping and team roping. I’d get off my bareback horse and immediate go get on my bulldogging horse. I’d get off that horse and immediately go get on my saddle bronc. My parents did absolutely perfect.”
That fortitude is paying off now that he’s in his mid-20s. He’s figured on a life as a rodeo cowboy since he was about 8, and he hasn’t looked back. It goes back to why he remains in Idaho when he’s not traveling north America riding 1,200 pounds of bucking dynamite night after night.
“My family is amazing,” Cooke said. “The support from my family, from my siblings and from my hometown is everything. I could be halfway across the country and make one phone call, and my whole family would fly out that second if they could.”
Having that in the back of his mind is why he won nearly $200,000 during the regular season. Cooke ended the campaign with a dozen rodeo victories, including a stretch of five events in just a few June days; he won the stand-alone bareback riding in Darby, Mont., and rodeos in Eagle, Idaho; Nampa, Idaho; Union, Ore.; and Elko, Nev., to pocket more than $37,000.
“That was a crazy week, but it’s funny thinking about Elko,” he said. “I had just won Nampa, and I had been on the road for a little bit and was looking for any excuse I had to go home and turnout of Elko. I had looked at the stock stats, and I had a decent horse in Elko, but I figured if I did the best I could, I was thinking I’d get sixth place.
“So, I called my dad, and I’m pretty much heading toward my house, not toward Elko, and I told my dad, ‘I don’t think this horse is very good, and I want to come home.’ Dad said, ‘Dude, have you seen what you’ve done this weekend? You’d be stupid if you didn’t go get on.’ ”
A quick U-turn resulted in an 89-point ride on Frontier Rodeo’s Lonesome Medicine and another big payday.
“I didn’t see that coming,” he said with a grin.
What was forecasted, though, was a return trip to the NFR, the sport’s Super Bowl and World Series wrapped in a 10-day battle vs. the best bucking horses in the world.
“When I draw a good one, I’m going to make sure that I do the best I can,” Cooke said. “I think just keeping a mentality that every ride matters, because it really does. I think that mentality has helped me a lot this year.”
It will come in very handy in Las Vegas.