About: Ted

ARLINGTON, Texas – No matter what happened during the first six nights of the National Finals Rodeo, Tanner Brunner kept his head in the game. There were three nights when his time was too long for him to cash in. He also suffered a broken barrier, which added a 10-second penalty to an otherwise solid run, and he had two no-times. Each night, though, he’d erase his memory of them and focus on the tasks at hand. It paid off, and he stopped the clock in 3.8 seconds Wednesday night to finish third in the seventh go-round. That was worth $15,654 and was his first paycheck of this year’s finale. “It can be trying at times,” said Brunner of Ramona, Kansas. “You just have to stay consistent, believe in the system, that you belong here and you have done the work and everything necessary to win. You’ve worked all year and past years to get here, and you belong here. “I had a great steer tonight and was glad to manage that and use him.” Times have been fast at this NFR. There were eight men who posted runs of 4.0 seconds or faster, and they all earned money – three cowboys finished in a tie for sixth place to extend the payout a bit, but those three pocketed less than 10 percent of Brunner’s nightly wage. But Brunner hasn’t always had the best opportunities. He had to take some chanced with less-than-ideal cattle, and he took the consequences that came with it. “That’s rodeo,” he said, referring to how cowboys are matched with their animals by random draw. “When it’s your turn, you will get a good one. You just have to stay ready. When it’s your turn, you need to capitalize on it.” Brunner pushed his season earnings to $72,539 and sits 13th in the world standings, but that also is a testament to how tough the competition has been. He has just three more nights to add to his bank account. “You’ve got the best bulldoggers in the world here,” Brunner said. “The stock is great. We’ve got all the atmosphere and everything. It just turned out to be a good bulldogging tonight. And he was right in the middle of it.

ARLINGTON, Texas – It’s taken three nights for Jess Pope to find his way back to the pay window at the National Finals Rodeo. It’s part of being one of the 15 best bareback riders in rodeo; there are 14 other guys chasing those same dollars, and everyone is riding like it. “I feel like I’m riding better than I ever have,” said Pope, 22, of Waverly, Kansas. “I’m just not worried about the money too much. I’m riding bucking horses and living the dream. When you go to focusing on the money, it’s going to affect your riding. I’m just taking care of my job. “They pay me to ride them. They don’t pay me to write the scores down. I’m really happy with how my finals is going. I’m riding very consistent, strong, and I’m ready for these last three just to see how it pans out.” On Wednesday night, he rode Beutler & Son Rodeo’s Bar Talk for 83.5 points to finish in a tie for third place in the seventh go-round. It was worth $13,327 and pushed his NFR earnings to $56,186. He now sits 10th in the world standings with $105,798, but there’s a kicker: He’s third in the average race with 592 cumulative points on seven rides. Should he remain in that position through the final night, he’ll add a bonus of $43,154 to his NFR paycheck. He just needs to stay as consistent as he has been to collect the money in the average. If he keeps matching up against animals of Bar Talk’s caliber. “I’ve seen that horse go quite a bit,” he said, noting that he hadn’t been on that particular Bennie Beutler bronc. “All of Bennie’s horses buck, but they ride good. I was excited to see my name beside him. Tim (O’Connell) won Burwell (Nebraska) on him two years ago, and I saw Blaine Kaufman win Burwell on him this year.” Beutler horses are well known for how hard they buck, but that doesn’t seem to bother the Kansas cowboy. “They’re up and down, but they’re bucking horses,” Pope said. “You just bury your chin, keep your shoulders back and let them hit you in the back (with their rumps as they buck). As long as you’re hitting them back, it’s fine. “I like getting on those horses. It was a good horse, and it felt good for me.”

ARLINGTON, Texas – John Aus isn’t new to this bareback riding thing; he was a pretty handy cowboy about three decades ago, but he’ll be the first to say good things about his son. Tanner Aus is at the National Finals Rodeo for the fifth time in his career. John never played on a stage this big, though he was a circuit champion in his time – that’s still quite a feat. His son is now 30, and he is an annual contender for the biggest prize in the game, the Montana Silversmiths gold buckle awarded to the world champion. “He is always quick with a reminder,” Tanner Aus said of his dad, just moments after posting an 83.5-point ride on Sankey Pro Rodeo & Phenom Genetics’ Irish Eyes to finish in a tie for third place in Wednesday’s seventh round of the National Finals Rodeo. “He’s a big proponent of fundamentals, too. If I am ever struggling with something, he can pick it out in a heartbeat because it’s just something that I’m not doing. He can give me a simple reminder on those fundamentals, and it usually sticks. That’s the way we carry-on.” It’s often helpful. For his work Wednesday, Aus pocketed $13,327 and pushed his NFR earnings to $67,750. He is third in the world standings with $129,476 and is a contender for the world title with three nights remaining in the 2020 season. Irish Eyes was just the right horse to get him back to the pay window for just the third time, but he’s making big money each time he places. “Some pens of horses are more fun than others,” he said. “The thing that carries a guy through is your fundamentals. The tougher the horse, the closer you’ve got to stick to those fundamentals. It’s not always pretty, but that is the way you’ve got to approach it.” He will be tested in Thursday’s eighth round, which features the second coming of the “Eliminator Pen.” He will be matched with Calgary Stampede’s Soap Bubbles, which bucked off Winn Ratliff in the third round. By definition, the eliminators are the hardest-to-ride horses in the game. He’ll utilize everything he knows about horses to master one of the nasty animals in ProRodeo. “You’ve got to keep your composure, especially when you’re in the chute,” Aus said. “If you’re calm, the horse is typically going to be calm. We know these horses good enough. If you don’t know what it is, you can ask somebody else, and they can tell you what your horse is going to be like in the chute, in the arena and what they’re going to feel like.” Any advantage a competitor can get can be helpful, especially when the foe is a 1,200-pound bucking beast.

ARLINGTON, Texas – Richmond Champion has been here before. Through seven nights of the National Finals Rodeo, he sits in contention for the prize he most covets: a world championship. To look at him, there is no worry or trepidation. He’s a man on a business trip, and his work involves riding bareback horses. He’s pretty good at it, too, having qualified for ProRodeo’s grand finale six times in seven years – the only year he missed was 2015, and injuries left him on the sidelines a little too long to put him into the top 15 when the regular season ended. At this year’s NFR, he’s placed in just four rounds so far, but he’s snagged some nice paychecks. He won the opening round last Thursday, then placed again on the third and fourth nights. He earned another payout Wednesday, when he rode Big Stone Rodeo’s Mayhem for 81.5 points to place fifth, worth $6,769. Still, he’s ridden consistently each night, and it shows. He is tied for first in the average race with 594 cumulative points on seven rides. That could be a big bonus in the end, but he’s already clinched $62,321. “It’s a marathon,” said Champion, who grew up in The Woodlands, Texas, and now lives in Stevensville, Montana, with his, Paige. “You’ve got to take the good with the bad. I feel like I’ve done a good job of placing on horses that normally don’t get placed on, taking advantage when they give me a chance. “The last two nights were a little bit of a lull, but I feel like I was riding good through those two rides, so I just tried to focus on that.” He’s got three more nights remaining in his 2020 campaign to see where it all takes him. If he remains at or near the top of the aggregate race, then he’s looking at a substantial bonus when the NFR ends Saturday night. “Three rounds are a long time,” he said. “My goal tonight was to just stay focused, don’t worry about the average, don’t worry about the world standings. I wanted to win some money, and we did that.” After the third cowboy to ride Wednesday night, Champion knew his chances of winning the round had been diminished. Canadian Orin Larsen scored 90 points on a Calgary Stampede bucking horse named Yippee Kibitz to win the round. After seeing that ride happen knew he and Mayhem had a big uphill climb. It was Mayhem’s second trip at this year’s NFR; he bucked off Jake Brown in the second round last Friday. “We have to take horses back a second time, and sometimes they’re not as good the second time,” Champion said. “After I watched Orin’s ride, I looked down at Mayhem in the chute and said, ‘Let’s just do our best today.’ “That’s a great little horse. He’s ranch-raised by Bruce Sundstrom (of Big Stone Rodeo), and I’ve seen him a lot. He didn’t have his best day, but it was still fun.”

ARLINGTON, Texas – For a young man in the middle of a world-title race, Wyatt Casper isn’t too concerned about the things outside of his control. He’s handling it like a veteran, and that’s a good thing. “Toward the beginning of the week, I had been staying focused on the standings, looking at the money, looking at it all,” said Casper, who rode Calgary Stampede’s Y U R Friskey for 85.5 points to finish in a tie for sixth place in Wednesday’s seventh go-round of the National Finals Rodeo. “I hadn’t had very good luck the last couple nights, so I stopped looking at that. I’m just going to stick to having fun. If it goes our way, it goes our way. There’s not a whole lot I can do about it if I don’t draw the best horses.” While he collected cash – $2,115 for sharing the same score with the No. 2 man, Ryder Wright – it wasn’t what he was hoping for with the Canadian bucking horse. “I’ve been on it at Fort Worth (Texas) this year, and I was 88.5,” Casper said. “It didn’t go quite as good, but he felt a little stronger than what he did the last time. I was pretty lucky to get by him. He kind of got me bucked off by the fourth jump. I got sat back down, and it felt good.” That’s the nature of saddle bronc riding. There’s nothing but stirrups and a rein that holds a cowboy down on the animal as it jumps, bucks and kicks, and matching that with the spurring motion the cowboy tries to make in rhythm with the horse can allow for some wild experiences. Lifting on the rein can help the cowboy more than anything. Another piece of the puzzle is the bronc, which receives half the score. When animals don’t perform up to par, then scores get dropped. Casper was just 82.5 points Tuesday night and finished a few spots out of the money. Still, he’s ridden six of seven horses he’s mounted and sits third in the average race with 520 cumulative points. The men above him in the aggregate have ridden all seven horses. “I felt like that horse (Tuesday) night was probably at the bottom of the pen,” he said regarding the random draw out of the 15 horses that were bucked in the round. “We’re just trying to keep getting horses down. It will fall where it falls. “I feel like I’m riding at the top of my game. We just hope we start running some really good horses under us and pick up a couple more first-place checks.” Casper has earned nearly $91,000 in seven nights of riding at Globe Life Field. He’s still No. 1 in the world standings with $235,946, but Wright has gained ground; Wright is less than $13,000 behind and sits first in the average. “I’m just going to stay focused,” said Casper of Miami, Texas. “I’m going to take it night by night and just stick to the game plan of riding them all as good as I can.”