2013 World Champion Bull Bushwacker started the year off with authority and vengeance on his hunt for a second world title. Even after being ridden by J.B. Mauney in August, nothing was going to stop Bushwacker from regaining the title that was his to lose.
By Justin Felisko
PUEBLO, Colo. ― If you’re about to climb aboard Bushwacker, you better enjoy roller coasters.
Don’t put your arms in the air or think about smiling. Just hold that bull rope tight and prepare yourself for a ride that will end with a face full of dirt after the fiercest and toughest bovine in the sport reminds you of how rank he really is.
He is the definition of rank. He is as fierce as they come. He is the roller coaster you want to avoid at all costs, even for the most avid of adventure seekers. Nine times out of 10, the ride is going to end on a downward spiral towards the arena floor.
Oh, and there’s likely never a soft landing with Bushwacker.
“He has such a unique bucking style compared to any other bull,” Shane Proctor said of Bushwacker, the 2013 World Champion Bull. “He feels way different than any other bull. It’s like a roller coaster. He is so long up and so fast down.”
Proctor was the first rider to face Bushwacker’s revenge after the 2011 World Champion Bull fell short of winning a second consecutive title when he lost to Asteroid last year at World Finals.
It was strictly business as usual for Bushwacker. He didn’t pose for a victory photo inside the Chesapeake Energy Arena. He left as quickly for the chutes as it took to buck off his first rider of the season.
This year was going to be different, Bushwacker emphatically stated.
A SEASON OF EXCELLENCE
The bull’s mission to regain his World Championship continued throughout the 2013 Built Ford Tough Series as he bucked off 11 riders in the regular season, during his march towards World Finals. Bushwacker recorded a season-high 10 Pabst Blue Ribbon Pabst Blue Ribbon high-marked bull awards and six of the Top 10 bull scores.
One of those top scores came under the lights at Cowboys Stadium, now known as AT&T Stadium, in Arlington, Texas, during the PBR’s Iron Cowboy. Going head-to-head with Asteroid, Bushwacker claimed the third-highest bull score of the season by earning 47.5 points in bucking off Austin Meier in 2.67 seconds.
“Bushwacker is slow and powerful and it just feels like you’re on a roller coaster that is climbing to make that drop,” Meier said last weekend in Las Vegas. “It is whether you can stay at the top long enough.”
Bushwacker even added a few extra bucks in celebration as Jones slowly picked up himself up from the arena floor near the bottom of the chutes.
It is an aura of championship confidence that Bushwacker has displayed throughout his entire career. He is always calm, yet you can tell he has the swagger of a champion. He has been called the Muhammad Ali of bull riding by PBR Director of Livestock Cody Lambert and has drawn comparisons to Michael Jordan for what he has done for the sport.
When he sees his champion bull enter the arena, Julio Moreno has flashbacks to the 1970s when he watched Ali fight Smokin’ Joe Fraser.
“He is like Muhammad Ali,” Moreno agreed. “He knew he was the greatest and he would strut his way through there and get ready for his event. When Bushwacker goes to compete, he is just real calm. He just walks in there, like struts in there, just like a guy walking in for a game – putting his pads on for a football game.”
RECORD BUCKOFF STREAK ENDS
Like Ali, Bushwacker was not perfect though, and he could have lost his championship confidence in August when J.B. Mauney ― the 2013 World Champion ― ended Bushwacker’s BFTS-record buckoff streak at 42 to start the second half of the season in Tulsa, Okla.
It was a battle of the two eventual champions, who had traded blows before. Bushwacker had previously bucked off Mauney eight times.
In a matter of 8 seconds, Bushwacker made a total of eight powerful jumps – many of which came in the form of a jagged up-and-down roller coaster ride with no end in sight – but somehow Mauney managed to hang with a little determination and grit.
Mauney was the first rider to make the whistle on Bushwacker since ThiagoPaguioto and Markus Mariluch conquered Bushwacker in 2009. They are the only three riders to have ridden Bushwacker for the full 8 seconds.
Bushwacker was marked 46.75 points in Tulsa and the ride gave Mauney a total score of 95.25 points. It was also the beginning of Mauney’s torrid second-half run that was capped off Sunday with the 2013 world title.
“Winning this world title means everything to you, but the highlight of this year was riding that bull,” Mauney said. “A bull so good and that great, he slammed me so many times, me and Kent sat back there I don’t know how many times and talked about it. That night I rode him, he looked at me and said, ‘I think I am more nervous than you,’ and I didn’t know why, because I was pretty nervous myself.
“To get lucky and get by a bull like that – there is no better feeling. You’re 10-feet tall and bulletproof. He is one of the greatest bulls I have ever seen.”
It was a greatness that was appreciated by bull riding greats, fans and even outsiders in 2013. If he wasn’t known of already outside the sport of bull riding after appearing in the New York Times, USA Today and the Wall Street Journal, then he certainly was by the time he appeared in ESPN The Magazine’s Body Issue in July and on ESPN’s “E:60” in September.
Having his bull dubbed “The Baddest Body in Sports” was a pretty special moment for Moreno.
“The ESPN Body Issue was pretty neat,” Moreno laughed. “That was pretty neat. That’s almost as top as the Sport’s Illustrated Swimsuit Edition. He could have been in that. We’ll put something on him somehow, a bikini.”
REBOUNDING LIKE A TRUE CHAMPION
During last week’s World Finals, Bushwacker demonstrated his championship mentality and ability to rebound from not only Mauney’s August ride, but a scare in the second round of the Finals against Douglas Duncan.
“You judge a rank bull by how far his front feet get off the ground,” Duncan said Sunday. “His front feet haven’t hit the ground yet, and he is kicking the lights out. He just has so much power getting into a spin. You just never know what he is going to do.”
Duncan said he was lucky to have him on a trip that fit him, but unfortunately, he slapped the World Champion bull. He believes Bushwacker is as ranked as they come.
“He’s got so much power getting into the spin,” he said. “Once you get to the spin, he is pretty good to ride. He never does the same thing twice. The other day, I rode him and touched him, and got lucky I had him on a trip where he fit me. I’ve been on him before where he didn’t have a trip that fit me and I got throttled.”
While riders normally need some luck on Bushwacker, the two-time World Champion Bull does not need that word in his vocabulary. He is pure talent and brute strength.
It is why it came as no surprise when Bushwacker was able to rebound from a potentially career-threatening injury in late 2011 when the World Champion Bull underwent two surgeries to have bone spurs and chips removed from both back hocks.
Bushwacker is accustomed to bouncing back.
He did just that on Sunday by bucking off Eduardo Aparecido in 4.57 seconds for a bull score of 47 points to clinch the 2013 World Champion Bull title inside the Thomas & Mack Center.
“That’s the heart of a true champion,” Bushwacker handler Kent Cox said. “The true champions, they always bounce back.
The man who was Bushwacker’s first victim in 2013 called the buckoff “phenomenal.”
“It didn’t surprise me at all,” Proctor said. “Bushwacker is a hell of an athlete. That trip he had today was phenomenal. It was pretty even with Asteroid after the first round, but he made a statement with this second round.”
The mission that Bushwacker, Moreno and Cox set out to chase in January finally came full circle.
Bushwacker rebounded from adversity, he answered his critics and he won his second World Champion Bull title to become just the fourth bull ever (along with Little Yellow Jacket, Bones and Dillinger) to win multiple bull championships.
“We have been trying to repeat again for two years,” Cox said. “There has been lots of miles and lots of hard work involved in this and I am just glad it all paid off. He was really outstanding. He really bucked (Sunday). That’s just the mark of a champion.”
It was an expected performance Lambert said.
“We knew Bushwacker would and buck like that,” Lambert said. “He definitely earned it. He has been the best bull for the last four years.”
Earlier this summer, Lambert confidently proclaimed Bushwacker the greatest bull of all time when asked about the bull’s record fame. That statement is even truer now after the bovine has claimed his second world title.
“He has earned it,” Lambert said. “He is that great. He is that uncommonly great. I don’t think – I am sure he is the best I’ve ever seen.”
