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By Alan Snel, LVSportsBiz.com Publisher/Writer
Long before the Vegas Golden Knights, Raiders, Allegiant Stadium and speedy Formula 1 race cars showed up in Las Vegas, this dusty desert oasis in the southern nook of Nevada was a horse town.
So, it’s back to the future for Las Vegas for the next 10 days when America’s real cowboys — not the Hollywood ones, or the NFL team, or the financial cowboys of Wall Street — take over Sin City with country music concerts and the “country lifestyle” up and down the Strip starting Thursday.
Thomas and Mack Center, the arena where UNLV basketball players were blocking shots and launching three-pointers last week, has been converted into a venue for the Super Bowl of all rodeos — the National Finals Rodeo, or just NFR.
Las Vegas Events, the LVCVA tourism agency’s non-profit events arm, said the LVE commitment to the PRCA-sanctioned rodeo championship is $15,170,128. During the 37-year relationship between Las Vegas and the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (PRCA), $426 million have been paid out since 1985. (In the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic year, the PRCA took the NFR to Texas).
About 17,000 people a night will pack every seat inside Thomas & Mack. There are also thousands more each day at watch parties around Las Vegas who will view the top 15 contestants compete in NFR’s eight categories. It’s hard to determine the exact number of visitors to the Las Vegas market for NFR, but a publicized number of 200,000 has been used. That’s still less than than the more than 300,000 out-of-market visitors who descend on Las Vegas for Super Bowl weekend.
The Colorado Springs-based PRCA sanctions rodeos across the country and runs this 10-day mega-rodeo with precision. In many ways, the NFR is one of America’s great traditional sports events, where they still pray to Jesus in a prayer before the competition and include some Las Vegas razzle-dazzle touches but nothing like Golden Knights games or NFL Super Bowl halftime shows.
The PRCA said this is the prize money at stake:
Total Prize Money: $10,900,098
Guaranteed Prize Money: $1,200,000
Competition Prize Money: $9,700,098