After some struggles at the 2024 National Finals Rodeo, Nebraska bareback rider Garrett Shadbolt let it motivate him this season. He earned nearly $170,000 riding bucking horses and will return to the NFR for the fourth time.
(PRCA PHOTO BY PHIL DOYLE)

 

MERRIMAN, Neb. – Garrett Shadbolt has been on a 12-month mission.

It’s redemption he seeks, and he’s given himself a chance to obtain it. He will make that next step during this year’s National Finals Rodeo, set for Dec. 4-13 in the Thomas & Mack Center at Las Vegas.

“This is my fourth time going to Vegas,” said Shadbolt, 29, a bareback rider from near Merriman. “I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how it went last year, and that was pretty bad. I guess I have a lot of ground to make up, so I’m back with a vengeance this time. I’m ready to get back to the NFR and have the performance I should have had last year.”

It was a rough 10 days in the Nevada desert for the Nebraska cowboy, but just making it to the sport’s grand championship is quite an accomplishment. Over the last five years, he’s only missed the NFR one time, and that was because an injury sidelined him most of the season.

Alas, he battled some of the rankest bucking horses in ProRodeo for a week and a half and never finished among the top six, which is what it takes to get paid at that marquee event. To add to the disappointment is that the NFR features the biggest pay for play each year. It was a chance to cash in, and Shadbolt left Las Vegas like many wannabe gamblers hoping to strike it rich.

“It’s always new when you’re in Vegas, and I don’t think a guy’s ever going to get used to that rodeo,” he said.

Still, it’s where he and every other cowboy making a living in the sport wants to be each December. His 2025 Revenge Tour commenced early. He was not only earning paychecks, but he cashed in big with the title in February at Rapid City, South Dakota. He continued a solid streak of paydays along the way, finishing the regular season seventh in the world standings with $168,261.

“It was a really good year,” said Shadbolt, who credits a portion of his success to his sponsors, Ranada Fashion, Crusty’s Feed Store, Dragonfly Performance Horses, Topp Hereford, Romsa Farm & Ranch and Fuel Grill in Gordon, Nebraska. “I rodeoed harder this year than I have probably since my rookie year.

“We put in a lot of work, but I was also traveling with two guys, Bradlee Miller and Gavin French. That was really fun; I haven’t traveled as three guys very often. We just had a really good group of guys put together. It was just a good deal all the way around.”

It was in multiple ways. French finished fourth in the Resistol Rookie of the Year race, and Miller will head to his second straight NFR third in the world standings with $207,474.

“Bradlee and I started off this year with the plan to finish first and second,” said Shadbolt, who lives in the country with his wife, Katie, and their four children: George, 5; Mavis, 3; Lindin, 2: and Prairie, who was born July 27. “We spent a decent amount of time one and two (in the standings) this year; that was pretty cool. We were splitting wins, which was great.

“We were also going one-two at rodeos. I’ve definitely never had that experience in my career before, but it was freaking awesome. We were really hot this winter. Showing up at a rodeo with your traveling buddy, and one guy wins and one guy gets second means you’re doing something right.”

He wants to parlay that run of good luck beyond the tables on The Strip and directly to the famous yellow bucking chutes inside the Thomas & Mack.

“The thing I probably learned the most last year is about having good gear, which I should know,” he said. “My gear really failed me bad at last year’s NFR, and it cost me a lot of money, so I’ve been working a lot harder to have better gear this year.”

He’ll need it. While the bucking horses are the best, so are the 14 other bareback riders. Only the elite in ProRodeo earn the right to compete in Las Vegas. There’s big money available, with go-round winners earning nearly $37,000 per night for 10 days. In his initial venture to the NFR in 2021, Shadbolt accrued nearly $100,000 over 10 December nights.

He’d like to get back to that and gain his redemption on the disappointment he had last year.

“Traveling with good people made it easier, but 100 percent of my driving force on this year has been to get back to Vegas and rectify how it went,” Shadbolt said. “I thought about it every single time I rode this year. It irritated me so much for a lot of different reasons, but mainly I know I can do so much better.

“It really lit a fire under my ass, because I hold myself to a higher standard than that.”

It comes from his raising. He is the fifth generation of his family to live and work on the northern portion of Nebraska in the middle of the Sandhills. His faith and work ethic were what drove him to wrestle at Doane College in Crete, Nebraska. When his intercollegiate career was complete, he turned to his roots and riding bucking horses.

He’s made a pretty good living at it. In 2019, he was the Bareback Riding Rookie of the Year. Since he started, he’s pocketed $615,000 while spurring 1,200 pounds of equine dynamite. He wants to keep adding to it. Rodeo is an important component to how he feeds his growing family, and diapers for a newborn aren’t cheap.

“It was tougher for me to be gone this year, because Prairie was born in July, so it really helped to trust in the good Lord,” Shadbolt said. “I was trusting Him to help me be home when the baby was born. In rodeo, you can’t afford to stay home for a month.”

He was prepared for just about anything. While the family typically goes more during the year, that wasn’t as available with the expecting baby. When he competed at the Calgary (Alberta) Stampede, his father, Quentin, flew to Canada and stuck around to support his son.

“Katie was super pregnant and due anytime, and I was there in Calgary, which is possibly the biggest rodeo of the year,” he said. “We took dad’s plane, and we were five and a half hours from home. He was my standby emergency flight home, because I was prepared to turn those wingtips for home if Katie went into labor.”

She didn’t until a couple weeks later. Shadbolt cleared $22,000 in Calgary, so it was a good trip, and he got to share some special time with his pop.

“It turned out to be super special having dad behind the bucking chutes and pulling my rigging with me,” Shadbolt said. “Just stepping out there with some big, scary bucking horses, and having my dad with me was outstanding. The crowd in Calgary is tremendous, so having dad help and winning two rounds was just unreal.”

Those are incredible moments. The memories will last his lifetime, but this is also his job, and business has been good. There will be no greater experience than performing before the sold-out fans inside the Thomas & Mack Center, and he will do that for the fourth time in his career.

Garrett Shadbolt has a statement about vengeance, and there’s no better place to make it happen.