BY BRETT NIERENGARTEN
At age 24, Brody Cress is already NFR-bound for the fourth time and he did in style this year, amassing more than $99,000 and wearing Back No. 14.
Cress set the tone for his season by winning the National Western and the San Antonio Stock Show and Rodeo right out of the gate.
In Denver, Cress placed in three of the four rounds and rode Avenger for 91 points to seal the victory. He won close to $6,000 at the rodeo.
In San Antonio, he didn’t cash a check until the last three rounds, but made his mark on the rodeo anyway. In the final two rounds, he rode Assailant for 85.5 points, which earned him $5,417. After that, he rode Womanizer for 90.5 points to get the win, and $11,700.
BRODY CRESS RIDES WOMANIZER FOR 90.5 POINTS IN SAN ANTONIO FINALS
“This rodeo is outstanding, being able to have these big winter rodeos with the bracket formats where you have the opportunity to get on a bunch of great horses and ride at a lot of money, I mean, it’s amazing,” he said following his win.
In July, Cress placed at six rodeos, earning $11,454 in the month. August, however, wasn’t great to him, but that changed when he showed up in South Dakota and started his sprint to the finish line.
On Aug. 27, he finished second at the Xtreme Broncs Finale in Rapid City and won more than $6,600 for his rides on Lunatic Lucy and Onion Ring.
BRODY CRESS RIDES ONION RING FOR 91 POINTS AT RAPID CITY X BRONCS
Rapid City was good this Wyoming cowboy because about a month later, Cress won $4,020 at the ProRodeo Tour Finale by way of placing first in the first two rounds of the event.
CRESS RIDES MARQUEE FOR 88.5 POINTS TO WIN ROUND 2 AT TOUR FINALE
In the last two weeks of the 2020 season, Cress won nearly $10,000.
He has come oh so close to a Gold Buckle multiple times, finishing as the Reserve World Champion in 2017 and 2019. He also won the Wrangler NFR Average in both of those years, finishing with a career-best $286,372 in earnings in 2019.
In 2020, Cress raised his average score from 81.37 to 83.19 and he had 35 rides for 85 points or more, smashing his previous best of 23 a year ago.
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