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This wasn’t just about a dramatic ending to the NRA Finals at Majestic Valley Arena during his tenure as bull riding director, this was a full-circle moment that was born from a small-town Montana act of kindness almost a decade ago.

While others push to the front of the line to be noticed, the Helena cowgirl rolls up her sleeves and just does what is needed.

The recently completed 49th Annual Northern Rodeo Association Finals presented by nuWest Builders was more than just a showcase for the top cowboys and cowgirls.

Pay them and they will come.

And enter, they did.

Warfield enters the Northern Rodeo Association Finals presented by nuWest Builders No. 1 in the barrel racing standings.

The hard-bucking rough stock provides half the points. The timed event horses get competitors to the right place in a hurry.

Toavs has been selected the announcer for the Northern Rodeo Association Finals presented by nuWest Builders at Majestic Valley Arena in Kalispell, Oct. 24-26.

May flat-out sizzled the final five weekends, earning wins at Superior, Twin Bridges, Deer Lodge, Boulder, Chinook and the regular-season finale in Helmville.

The excitement-filled, pressure-packed Mountain Health Co-Op Tour has showcased another record-breaking season.

Molly Salmond wastes no time in arena

The 24-year-old is enjoying her best summer for the Mountain Health Co-op Tour, sitting in the top three for the breakaway roping standings.

“It’s been a good year,” acknowledged Cornwell. “I don’t really have a game plan for the season. I just go hard at it every time.”

Tito’s Handmade Vodka is the newest label to join forces with the Northern Rodeo Association and Northern Women’s Rodeo Association.

Her weekends are spent learning with her horses – Freckles and Dolly -- finding ways to maximize their skills and hers in barrel racing and breakaway roping.

For a little more than a decade, the Libby cowboy was a bull rider, accumulating more bumps and bruises than paychecks.

The rodeo – one of three during the July Fourth run – is a game-changer for those pursuing a berth in the Northern Rodeo Association and Northern Women’s Rodeo Association Finals in October.

Roping with his father Jon, the 22-year-old Hubing is sixth in the Mountain Health Co-op Tour team roping heading standings. 

Gaasch, a 17-year-old cowboy from Dillon, was the high-money winner, pocketing $5,378.

Climbing the rodeo ladder can be a slow process.

It’s more than just riding, roping and racing.

Paul Eiker has been involved with rodeo for a long time. Pretty much his entire life.

Rodeo's next generation showing its skills

The Capital City cowboy began his pursuit of a three-peat opening weekend, winning the steer wrestling at Whoop-Up Trail Days in Conrad to start the Mountain Health Co-Op Tour for 2024.

Record setting payouts. NRA and NWRA events, including the NRA Finals, paid out more than $800,000 a year ago.

Before they were setting records, before they became famous for their rodeo talents, Haven Meged and Lisa Lockhart shared another common trait.

Fantastic, terrific, thrilling, pulse-pounding, historic … the list is long.

So many to choose when describing the 2023 Northern Rodeo and Northern Women’s Rodeo seasons.

The NRA and NWRA wrapped up the recording-setting year with its 48th Annual NRA Finals presented by nuWest Builders in Kalispell.

His rodeo summer was going OK, but if he wanted to contend for a second year-end championship in three years, Detton knew he needed more giddyup in his steer wrestling runs.

While a relative newcomer to Big Sky Country, the 24-year-old cowboy from Charlo is making himself right at home at rodeo arenas across the Treasure State.

Celie Salmond is chasing more than gold buckles and championship saddles.

Salmond is chasing history.

Every time he gets knocked down, the Townsend bull rider dusts himself off and gets right back in the chute.

The Mountain Health Co-op Tour regular season concluded with rodeos in Hamilton and Helmville.

Both begin with the letter H. Both have rodeos this Labor Day weekend produced by Red Eye Rodeo.

And both represent the last opportunity for cowboys and cowgirls to qualify for the Northern Rodeo Association Finals presented by nuWest Builders.

Parker Mothershead admits he is a bit surprised about his rodeo season this summer.

He shouldn’t be.

Shane Moran has worn a lot of cowboy hats during his lifetime.

Now 45 and a married father of two daughters, he is changing cowboy hats once again.

He came, he rode, he took the money.

Then he rode some more and earned two high school world titles.

The money won vaulted Malone to the top of the barrel racing standings where she has been since mid-July.

He’s firmly among the top 10 in the Mountain Health Co-op bareback riding standings and the same for team roping headers.

If the second half of the season is anything like the first, buckle up.

It’s going to be a wild ride.

A shift in gears to her breakaway roping approach and a team roping horse now turning barrels has Levine firmly in the top 10 of the standings for both events in the Mountain Health Co-op Tour.

Fireworks in the sky weren’t the only things making people happy during the Fourth of July holiday.

Mountain Health Co-Op Tour rodeos in Harlowton, Ennis and Choteau handed out 50 checks of $700 or more to some very happy cowboys and cowgirls.

The 24-year-old Salmond offered a glimpse of her 2023 with her performance at the Northern Rodeo Association/NWRA Finals last October in Kalispell.

Working both ends of the arena, the likable cowboy opened the Mountain Health Co-op Tour by placing in three events at Conrad and doing the same the next week in Culbertson.

Before Rasmussen was the most popular funnyman in western sports, before he was selected the PRCA Clown of the Year for eight consecutive years, he was a small-town teenage college kid trying to scratch a powerful itch to entertain.

For a half-century, Dick Lyman has been intertwined with Jacobs Livestock Rodeo.

Since graduating high school, if there was a job to be done, and done right, Lyman was there.

The Whitefish-based company, which designs and builds custom luxury homes, has signed on to be the sponsor of the Northern Rodeo Association Finals.

The culmination of the Mountain Health Co-Op Tour put an exclamation point on a 2022 rodeo season where high fuel prices and historic flooding would not slow competitors from chasing gold buckle dreams.

The Finals represent the culmination of the Mountain Health Co-Op Tour held this past summer. The Finals showcases the best of the best, the top 10 competitors in each event vying for the year-end championship for 2022.

The Choteau cowgirl returns to the Northern Rodeo Association/Northern Women’s Rodeo Association Finals leading both the breakaway roping and all-around cowgirl standings.

Having started team roping in junior high, Ayre has been throwing loops for more than half a century.

After competing in 31 rodeos in every corner and across the Big Sky State, it has come down to this:

Another successful Mountain Health Co-Op Tour regular season comes to an end this weekend with rodeos in Hamilton and Helmville.

Competing at her hometown rodeo in Superior, the teenager had the opportunity to show why she was rapidly climbing the Northern Women’s Rodeo Association barrel racing standings.

As the Mountain Health Co-Op Tour gears up for the final stretch of the regular season, the pair are again atop the standings.

She is a strong bet to make the Finals this October.

Garrett Cunningham, 19, has won eight events this summer, the most of any competitor for a single event.

If the second half is anything like the first half, the Mountain Health Co-Op Tour will have a fantastic finish.

For eight days, the small community outside of Gardiner will a crucial part of the Mountain Health Co-Op Tour with four rodeos scheduled.

Hailey Burger understands full well of respecting your elders.

McAlpine has traded back flips for bucking horses and bulls.

Now he has gold buckle dreams.

Tyler Houle’s 2021 rodeo season was like a sad country song.

“My truck broke down, my horse got injured,” offered the Bozeman steer wrestler.

Now the 23-year-old cowboy is singing a much better tune in 2022.

Two talented cowgirls from two different generations.

And sharing so many similarities.

After Quinn McQueary put the football down for the final time, he needed another outlet to scratch his strong competitive itch.

Knight opened the 2022 Mountain Health Co-op Tour the same way she closed 2021

The Mountain Health Co-Op Tour will deliver again when the 2022 season begins with Conrad Whoop Trail Days, June 3-4. Conrad is the annual season opener for the NRA and Northern Women’s Rodeo Association.

The 47th annual NRA/NWRA Finals wrapped up a terrific Mountain Health Co-op Tour to determine the year-end champions. The top 10 in each event qualified for the organization’s showcase event.

Northern Rodeo Association/Northern Women’s Rodeo Association Finals event, Oct, 28-30 at the Majestic Valley Arena in Kalispell, features the top-10 finishers from the Mountain Health Co-op Tour.

Levine and team roping partner Ian Austiguy of Dillon both have leads of $2,770 over Dustin Datisman of Arlee (headers) and Ronan’s Josh Harris (heelers).

That makes Levine a realist entering the Finals.

Caden Camp will be one busy cowboy at the Northern Rodeo Association/Northern Women’s Rodeo Associations Finals.

Along with establishing himself as one of the state’s next generation of top bareback riders, Petersen took his rodeo game to another level during the third week in July in Lincoln, Nebraska.

There, the Helena Capital senior won the National High School Finals Rodeo all-around cowboy title.

Every time J Billingsley and his daughters Brooklyn and Bailey enter the arena, they are doing more than roping and racing.

Rosie likes it loud. The more noise the better.

That is when Alexis McDonald knows her seven-year-old sorrel chestnut is ready to run.

Already an accomplished saddle bronc rider on the Mountain Health Co-op Tour, the Two Dot cowboy decided to return to an event of his youth.

Brice Patterson, Dixon Winn and Caleb McMillon are different from their peers.

But in a good way.

Everyone involved agreed that they were heading into uncharted territory for the 2021 rodeo season.

Bella Fossum is giving new definition to the phrase “driven to succeed.”

After a five-year absence, the Great Northern RAM Rodeo returns to the Northern Rodeo Association’s Mountain Health Co-op Tour.

Brice Patterson created his own fireworks during the Fourth of July run for the Mountain Health Co-Op Northern Rodeo Association Tour.

The Choteau cowgirl started her 2021 by winning the breakaway roping at Conrad, the first event of the season for the Northern Women’s Rodeo Association.

Entering the championship round of the College National Finals Rodeo, Tayla Moeykens was sitting in fourth place.

She would need another good barrel run – Moeykens had already won rounds one and three – and get a little help to be in national title contention.

“Onward and upward, bigger and better,” declared Joe Warner, the NRA president.

NRA Announces Judges & Timers Clinic

To salute all those involved and to honor our 2020 champions, the NRA / NWRA is working towards an awards banquet.

Every rodeo in the abbreviated season became that much more important and competitors were willing to go the extra distance in pursuit of titles.

In a season filled with twists and turns and stops and starts, the final road to year-end championships lead to Helmville.

And he has a good reason to return to his home state and make his way to the small unincorporated community in western Montana.

Because of the continuing impact of COVID-19, the NRA board has made the decision to cancel the 2020 NRA Finals.

Cowboys and cowgirls chasing year-end championships in the Northern Rodeo Association and Northern Women’s Rodeo Association have had to go the extra mile this season.

Northern Rodeo Association Breakaway Roping Paves the Way

A seven-time world champion, Dan Mortensen has had his picture taken thousands of times.

And he has about the same number in bulging scrapbooks at home.

But one of those pictures, taken in August of 1983, is among his favorites.

Caleb Meeks has studied rodeo history, taught rodeo history and is now creating some of his own rodeo history.

As her mother maneuvered the family truck and horse trailer toward the rodeo arena in Harlowton, Jody Sarchett sat in the passenger seat, looking out the window as the memories started flooding back.

It had been two decades since Sarchett roped at one of the Fourth of July mainstay rodeos for the Northern Rodeo Association and Northern Women’s Rodeo Association.

The Malta rodeo on Saturday is new to the NRA/NWRA schedule. The stock contractor is the Treasure State Rodeo Company.

“It’s kind of a big deal to be with the NRA,” said McEwen.

McEwen formed a rodeo committee last fall and in January the group approached the NRA and NWRA about having a sanctioned event with one of the strongest grass roots rodeo organizations in the United States.

There are certain staples associated with the Fourth of July holiday.

Family fun, fireworks and plenty of good fun quickly come to mind.

And for rodeo fans, it isn’t a Fourth of July without Northern Rodeo Association and Northern Women’s Rodeo Associated events in Ennis and Harlowton.

Big Timber is celebrating the 97th anniversary of its annual rodeo, a good many of those years sanctioned by the Northern Rodeo Association and Northern Women’s Rodeo Association.

The Northern Rodeo Association and Northern Women’s Rodeo Association are preparing to gallop into the 2020 season.

In consideration of the current situation regarding COVID-19 (coronavirus), the Northern Rodeo Association (NRA) and the Northern Women’s Rodeo Association (NWRA) is continuing to monitor regulations and mandates from local, state and national authorities. At this time, the 2020 NRA / NWRA is proceeding with our schedule and will make modifications as we progress forward if needed.