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PUEBLO, Colo. – Three years ago, nine-time PBR World Finals qualifier Shane Proctor rode Pneu Dart’s Doomsday for 85 points inside Madison Square Garden during what he believed was his final PBR premier series event.
Proctor wanted to focus solely on his PRCA schedule, where he could compete full-time in various rodeo events beyond just bull riding.
The 2011 PRCA bull riding champion, though, may be returning to the PBR’s highest level of competition in 2021, depending on how he does at next week’s Cedar Park Chute Out PBR Pendleton Whisky Velocity Tour event in Texas on Jan. 15-16.
Proctor did compete at last year’s Monster Energy Team Challenge (4-for-10), but he has not participated at a PBR event with world points on the line since he left New York City on January 7, 2018, to focus primarily on his rodeo career.
“Well, 2020 was a crazy year, and 2021 is going to be even more nuts, and we've had a lot of rodeos cancel early on in January with restrictions, and so I thought I might as well buy my PBR card back and just go hit everything I can when I can,” Proctor said on Friday morning. “I like to compete, and I don’t really like days off.”
Proctor, who also plans to still rodeo in 2021, is one of 45 bull riders slated to compete at the 2021 Velocity Tour season-opener in Cedar Park.
Also tentatively riding in Cedar Park are 11-time PBR World Finals qualifier Valdiron de Oliveira, 2011 Rookie of the Year Rubens Barbosa, Wallace Oliveira, Junior Patrik Souza, Marcus Mast, Rafael Henrique dos Santos, Alex Cardozo and Ky Hamilton.
Fans can watch the event exclusively on RidePass beginning at 9 p.m. ET on Jan. 15 and 8 p.m. ET on Jan. 16.
The winner of the two-day bull riding will earn an automatic bid to the Unleash The Beast event in Okeechobee, Florida.
“Yeah, I prefer Florida,” Proctor said with a laugh. “It’s warm.”
Proctor won the bull riding at the 92nd annual Arcadia All-Florida Championship Rodeo last year, and he has a series of fond memories of rodeoing in Florida. In fact, one of Proctor’s favorite bronc rides came in Arcadia years ago.
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“Arcadia used to be a really, really cool outdoor rodeo, and two years ago, they built a new building with a covered roof that's super nice too,” he said. “There are some cowboy people that live there in Florida. (Competing in Florida) is awesome because I like that type of thing, driving around. You'll see nothing but pastures and big open huge cattle farms. Then you are in swamplands, and then back to cattle country.”
Would Proctor consider competing full-time on the Unleash The Beast: American Roots Edition if he were to qualify and potentially make a run at the 2021 PBR World Finals?
“I'm just playing it by ear,” Proctor said. “I mean, with everything, with all the restrictions, we don't know what this year is going to entail. There will be more PRCA guys buying their PBR cards, and I think there will be a lot of PBR guys buying their PRCA cards, simply for the fact that there's not always an event every weekend and they need to fill gaps.”
The 35-year-old has 252 rides on the PBR’s premier series, eight of which were for 90 or more points, and eight event wins, including a PBR Major victory at the 2016 Iron Cowboy.
Proctor finished 2020 ranked 28th in the PRCA bull riding standings, and he has yet to qualify for the NFR since he left the PBR. However, he is off to a good start in 2021 with a second-place finish (90.5 points on Smoke Stack) at the Rodeo Austin Xtreme Bulls event, and he is ranked No. 1 in the early PRCA bull riding standings.
The Grand Coulee, Washington, native will be competing at the Sandhills Stock Show & Rodeo in Odessa, Texas, PRCA event before heading to Cedar Park.
“I am nickel-and-diming the shit out of them,” Proctor said. “I actually had a good run close to Cedar Park in November. I am starting the year fresh, and maybe I can pull off a Boudreaux (Campbell) and qualify for both.”
Proctor and his wife, Haley, welcomed their first child, Coulee, into the world this past November, and he is grateful to have places to compete and earn a living for his family. Whether it was the PBR and its Monster Energy Team Challenge or various rodeo committees, Proctor said he can’t say thank you enough to those that are finding ways to put money in cowboys’ pockets during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“From the rodeo side of things, there were so many little committees that stepped up this year and put on rodeos when they knew they were going to take a loss,” Proctor said. “That's the thing as far as contestants go; we need to still appreciate those communities and committees. We still need to support them for the ones that stood by us. I went to more places this year that I had never been to simply because we just didn't have anywhere else to go.
“We're just thankful for any opportunity that we get that to go and compete right now. With everything that's going on, our world will probably never be the same, and it is changing in a hurry. It is scary times and a lot of uncertainty. We have to just support the ones we do have and be there for them and just go get to anything we can.”
Follow Justin Felisko on Twitter @jfelisko
Photo courtesy of Andy Watson/Bull Stock Media