The World Championship Rodeo Alliance’s Feb. 28 Royal City Roundup in Kansas City, Missouri, featured just nine bull riders. Among them were current world standings leader Jose Vitor Leme, two-time world champion Jess Lockwood, world number-three Joao Ricardo Vieira, and a 19-year-old from Rifle, Colorado, named Colten Fritzlan.
Fritzlan is a sophomore at Western Texas College in Snyder, to which, in addition to his laptop, headphones and other college-kid accoutrements, he brought along five 1,500-pound-plus bulls from back home on Colorado’s Western Slope. In addition to riding bulls on the Western Texas College rodeo team, Fritzlan is a rookie on the pro tour, and the bulls are for practicing.