PUEBLO, Colo. – This past weekend, two-time World Champion Jose Vitor Leme won his third event of the 2023 season with a victory at the PBR Wrangler Long Live Cowboys Classic in Sacramento, California.

Leme missed the first five events of the season due to a rib injury, which means he’s earned three wins in just five events.

During his 2020 World Championship campaign, it took him seven events to notch three wins. In his record-setting 2021 World Championship season, it took him ten events.

A Jose Vitor Leme on a blazing pace, even to his historic standards, is a worrisome prospect for all other riders in the locker room.

The win in Sacramento was the 26^th premier series event win of Leme’s career – which, for the record, only dates back to 2017.

Watching him make history begs the question: where does he rank among the legends? Who actually are the winningest bull riders in PBR history?

Well, let’s dust off the record books and find out.

T1. J.B. Mauney – 32 event wins

It’s no surprise to see the Dragon Slayer at the top of this list, as he’s at or near the top of most lists of PBR records, including money earned (No. 1 with $7,419,474.90), wins in a season (No. 3 with six), highest ride score (No. 8 with 95.25 points), consecutive rides (No. 2 with 16), 90-point rides (No. 2 with 75), consecutive World Finals qualifications (No. 2 with 15) and qualified rides (No. 2 with 538).

Most of Mauney’s event wins came in his first World Championship season of 2013 when he was victorious six times. His first wins came back in 2007 when he was crowned Rookie of the Year. He won four events in a season as recently as 2016 but won only two events after that – his last win came in 2019 at the Bad Boy Mowdown in Little Rock, Arkansas.

T1. Justin McBride – 32 event wins

Another name we’re accustomed to seeing at the top of PBR records is two-time World Champion Justin McBride. Leme was chasing down one of McBride’s records as he pursued the 2021 world title, ultimately tying him for the most wins in a season with eight. McBride is right behind Mauney with 74 career 90-point rides and was the first bull rider to earn $5 million in his career.

McBride won the world title in 2007, helped along by his record-setting eight wins that season. He won a not-too-shabby six events en route to his world title in 2005. His last wins came in 2008, the year he hung up his bull rope. He has since become a respected color commentator for PBR broadcasts on CBS, coached the Team USA Eagles to two Global Cup titles, and helmed the PBR Team Series Champion Nashville Stampede in 2022.

3. Adriano Moraes – 29 event wins

The PBR’s first World Champion and first three-time World Champion, Adriano Moraes was nothing if not a trailblazer. His first wins came in the PBR’s first season in 1994 and kept on coming until 2008. He won world titles in 1994, 2001 and 2006 – an almost unthinkable spread of 13 years. He holds the third-longest consecutive ride streak in PBR history with 15, set from 2000-01. He notched 47 90-point rides in his career and won four events in a season three times (1997, 2001, 2004).

Moraes retired, along with McBride, after the 2008 PBR World Finals, and the sport has simply not been the same since.

4. Jose Vitor Leme – 26 event wins

It took Mauney 13 seasons to win 32 events. McBride won 32 events in ten seasons. Moraes won 29 events in 15 seasons.

Leme has won 26 events in less than seven seasons. And, if his hot start to 2023 is any indication, he’s not slowing down any time soon.

He holds the record, along with McBride, of most event wins in a season with eight, which he accomplished in 2021 en route to the world title. In 2020, also en route to the world title, he won seven events. He has the two highest-scoring rides in PBR history – 98.75 points and 97.75 points, both records set 100 days apart – and the only perfect rider score of 50 in PBR history. Leme is already up to No. 4 on the all-time 90-point ride list with 62 – in 2001, he set the season record with 24 90-point rides (and 21 round wins).

RELATED: Frustration, doubt and worries were never an option for Leme during historic second World Championship season

What might he achieve in 2023?

5. Guilherme Marchi – 25 event wins

Rounding out the Top 5 is 2008 World Champion Guilherme Marchi, who also happens to top the list of riders with the most qualified rides in PBR history with a whopping 635. (He’s the only rider to have crossed the 600-ride threshold.)

The famously gregarious Marchi won his first events in 2005 and won his last at the Caterpillar Classic in Kansas City in 2018. His most event wins in a season came in his world title campaign of 2008, when he won four. Marchi retired in 2018 and was immediately inducted into the PBR Ring of Honor, a fitting end to a truly storied career.

No. 6-10: Kaique Pacheco (22), Chris Shivers (20), Joao Ricardo Vieira (18), Silvano Alves (15) and Cooper Davis (15)

Photo courtesy of Andy Watson/Bull Stock Media