With less than a week remaining before the inaugural Kid Rock’s Rock N Rodeo this Friday, May 17, at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, the 16-athlete roster for the Free Riders team has been announced.
Kid Rock’s Rock N Rodeo is a reimagined rodeo produced by PBR in partnership with Kid Rock. Six teams, each led by a legendary rodeo head coach, will compete head-to-head in bracket-style competition for a $1 million purse. Within the new $1-million team-formatted rodeo, Kid Rock will perform live in concert.
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The Free Riders, under the leadership of four-time PRCA (Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association) world champion bareback rider Bobby Mote, was the lone team formed independent of the Kid Rock’s Rock N Rodeo Draft held this past March. The Free Riders were fielded based on the WCRA’s (World Champion Rodeo Alliance) Major rodeo in Corpus Christi, Texas, Rodeo Corpus Christi, which concluded on May 11. The Top 2 athletes in each discipline not already drafted to one of the other five teams earned a chance to ride for the Free Riders.
The talent-packed 16-athlete roster holds three World Championships, four National Finals Rodeo (NFR) aggregate wins, and 35 NFR qualifications, and has amassed more than $8.7 million in career earnings.
The WCRA Free Riders roster is as follows:
- Breakaway Roping: Kiely Walz (Ainsworth, Nebraska) and Marybeth Beam (Poetry, Texas)
- Bareback Riding: Nick Pelke (Mondovi, Wisconsin) and RC Landingham (Hat Creek, California)
- Barrel Racing: Bayleigh Choate (Fort Worth, Texas) and Makenzie Mayes (Winnsboro, Texas)
- Saddle Bronc Riding: Cash Wilson (Wall, South Dakota) and Cole Elshere (Faith, South Dakota)
- Steer Wrestling: Cody Doescher (Webbers Falls, Oklahoma) and Levi Rudd (Chelsea, Oklahoma)
- Team Roping: Luke Brown (Header | Rock Hill South Carolina)/Jade Corkill (Heeler | Fallon, Nevada) and Jake Smith (Header | Broken Bow, Oklahoma)/Douglas Rich (Heeler | Herrick, Illinois)
- Tie Down Roping: Jarvis Demery (Beggs, Oklahoma) and Quade Hiatt (Canyon, Texas).
MaryBeth Beam and Kieley Walz:
The momentum behind both Beam and Walz is undeniable heading into Kid Rock’s Rock N Rodeo. Aside from an underdog-type mentality after being passed over in the KRRR draft and battling through WCRA Corpus Christi to be selected, Beam and Walz have had solid rodeo seasons in their respective arenas.
Beam is a sophomore ProRodeo competitor, having finished No. 2 in the 2023 Resistol Rookie of the Year race. Since then she’s been a frequent name on WPRA results, winning the WPRA Western Region Calgary Stampede Breakaway Qualifier in April. In the WCRA arena, Beams’ record includes go-round wins at the Stampede at the E in January and Rodeo Corpus Christi.
Walz, on the other hand, is just old enough to compete on the team, having turned 18 in late March. The reigning NHSFR Breakaway Champion is also competing in the Women’s Rodeo World Championship this week in the Challenger division, making for a busy week.
More about the WCRA Free Riders team:
Choate (barrel racing), Wilson (saddle bronc riding) Brown/Corkill (team roping) and Demery (tie down roping) are all ready to compete at the landmark $1 million Kid Rock’s Rock N Rodeo fresh off being crowned Rodeo Corpus Christi event winners.
For Fort Worth’s own Choate, the 20-year-old delivered a lightning fast 14.358-second run in the barrel racing to punch her ticket to the team-formatted rodeo inside the home of the NFL’s Dallas Cowboys. In the saddle bronc riding inside American Bank Center Arena, Wilson dominated, delivering an 87.5-point ride to beat out the second-place finisher by four points. Brown and Corkill lit up the scoreboard in the team roping, logging a 6.00-second run to win with ease, running a full 4.17 seconds faster than the runner-up. Demery rounded out the winning contingent at Rodeo Corpus Christi, logging a 7.52-second run to claim victory by a margin of 4.482 seconds.
Other headline riders on the Free Riders roster include RC Landingham, the first and only victor of the $1 million Triple Crown of Rodeo bonus, earned in 2022. In winning the bonus, he became just the fourth athlete in Western sports history to become an overnight millionaire. Prior to Rodeo Corpus Christi, where he finished third, Landingham had been sidelined by injury.
The Free Riders will also boast an accomplished team roping duo in Brown and Corkill. Brown is a three-time NFR aggregate winner and 12-time qualifier as a header to the year-end event, while Corkill is a three-time World Champion heeler, one-time NFR aggregate winner and 13-time qualifier.
The experienced pair, along with winning Rodeo Corpus Christi together, also roped together at the 2008 National Finals Rodeo, placing in seven of the 10 rounds.
In addition to the Free Riders team, two substitutes were announced for the other five competing teams.
On the Convoy, Dean Thompson (Altamont, Utah) replaces Tim O’Connell (Zwingle, Iowa) in the bareback riding, while on the Jokers, Joey Williams (Volborg, Montana) will substitute Jordi Edens (Gatesville, Texas) in the breakaway roping.
Kid Rock’s Rock N Rodeo will begin on Friday, May 17 at 7:45 p.m. CT inside AT&T Stadium. When the dust settles on the historic event, the famed venue will then host the PBR World Finals: Unleash The Beast – Championship on Saturday, May 18 at 7:45 p.m. CT and Sunday, May 19 at 1:45 p.m. CT, when the 2024 PBR World Champion will be crowned, earning the accompanying $1 million bonus and coveted gold buckle.
Tickets for both Kid Rock’s Rock N Rodeo and PBR World Finals – Championship can be purchased online at ATTStadium.com, SeatGeek.com, KidRockNRodeo.com and PBR.com/WorldFinals, or by phone at 1-800-732-1727.
