By Alan Snel of LVSportsBiz.com
LVSportsBiz.com photos by J. Tyge O’Donnell
More than just cowboys in Wranglers and women in Western attire roam the concourse of Thomas & Mack Center, packed for Day 1 of the 10-day super-rodeo called NFR Thursday evening.
Through the years, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Kevin Costner have been seen at the National Finals Rodeo, where 120 contestants battle it out in seven rodeo categories where tenths of seconds in steer wrestling, for example, can be the difference in hundreds if not thousands of dollars in earnings.
“The celebrities are just out here. They’re not incognito. You’ll be walking along and say, ‘Oh shit, there’s Kevin Costner,’ ” cracked Pat Christenson, president of Las Vegas Events, which works with the rodeo-sanctioning Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association to stage the annual rodeo extravaganza.
In a town that prides itself on glitz and over-the-top showmanship, the National Finals Rodeo doesn’t get too crazy with the music and light shows. Rodeo is about heritage and and the contestants are the stars.
“We’re limited by the theme. We focus on the contestants. We don’t have a lot of timeouts,” Christenson observed.
Besides, the seven rodeo events are staged with timed precision and the nightly event that starts at 6:45 p.m. doesn’t run longer than two hours. “We have projection mapping (in the arena), but we’ll only take that so far,” Christenson said. “You have to let the contestants speak for themselves.”
Longtime NFR General Manager Shawn Davis has turned the job over to former rodeo competitor and NFR announcer Boyd Polhamus. And firmly entrenched in the PRCA CEO’s job is George Taylor, who has two years on the job as the pro rodeo group’s chief executive. He replaced Karl Stressman, who rode into the sunset two years ago.
The contestants draw 17,000 rodeo fans a night, but there are thousands of others who never make it to Thomas & Mack Center watching the action at parties up and down the Strip. Plus, there’s plenty of spending at Western lifestyle exhibitor events from Mandalay Bay to the Las Vegas Convention Center. And there are parties after the competition.
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