2023 College National Finals Rodeo (CNFR ) | College National Finals Rodeo en vivo
Location : Casper, WY
Date : Tuesday, 13-17 June, 2023
WATCH LIVE: College National Finals Rodeo
“I thought it was a pretty good day,” said Bobcat coach Kyle Whitaker. “The first round of breakaway was Sunday and it didn’t go as good as I was hoping, but they came back and did better today. It was a better first round this year than last year.”
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Bode Spring led the men’s team by finishing third in the first go-round in the tie-down roping, while Caleb Meeks finished 25th in the first saddle bronc round and stands second in the second go-round of that event. “I was happy how Bode Spring did in the tie-down and Caleb had good second round saddle bronc.
All six Cowboys and four Cowgirls competed in Monday’s slack, with two men’s competitors finishing the second of three guaranteed rounds. Tuesday is another round of slack, with the first of five consecutive night performances beginning that evening. Each contestant will be featured in the night performances Tuesday through Friday, with the top 12 individual times/marks from the week qualifying for Saturday’s short go Saturday evening.
The College National Finals Rodeo (CNFR) will be held on June 11-17 at the Ford Wyoming Center in Casper. The rodeo has been hosted there each year except for 2020 when the rodeo was canceled due to the pandemic since 1999.
“The rodeo itself is the same as every other year. We crown our national champions, but this year, we’re doing a little something different for more of a celebration of these kids getting here,” said Jim Dewey Brown, commissioner of the National Intercollegiate Rodeo Association, which oversees the CNFR. “We’re going to have an armband ceremony similar to a back number ceremony.”
Rodeo contestants often wear a number on their back or chest that designates their participation. This includes a vest with their college or university’s insignia for the CNFR. The armband has this information and goes around one of the arms of the contestants to designate this same information.
The number of rodeo participants remains constant each year, with a limit of how many can compete in the finals event, which is approximately 400 student-athletes each year. Brown added last year that around 3,500 student athletes competed in collegiate rodeo at both two-and four-year colleges and universities but only around 400 make it to the finals event.
“Basically, the changes are the kids,” he said. “They basically rotate out, some of them we might see four or five times. But that’s the biggest change is the contestants are generally different every year.”
There’s a chance CNFR will change its host city in 2027 when a current contract expires.
