CHEYENNE, Wyo. – Exercising a leap of faith, Sage Kimzey survived a risky decision and collected an unprecedented third CBR World Championship in front of an ecstatic packed house on night two of the five round bull riding competition that thrills Frontier Park each year as part of Cheyenne Frontier Days – and nights.
"I just kind of let the moment take over, feed off the crowd and everything, it never gets old, big pressure moments for a lot of money are moments of pure perfection for me, it's all I have every wanted to do, it's an awesome experience and an awesome night," said Kimzey.
Missing the first two rounds of this year's $300,000 edition of the CBR World Finals, Kimzey risked his third CBR title by staying in Utah to compete in a large added money professional rodeo on Monday night. Kimzey described what it was like to come in two bulls behind.
"It's sketchy, I don't kike cutting it that close and I prayed about my decision and the Lord told me where I needed to be, I know my capabilities as an athlete and I know who I am as a bull rider and I knew what I had to do," said Kimzey while signing autographs.
Kimzey's win equation could have gone either way, but in the end he rode a bull he had never seen, 756 Whacked Out (Burleson Barnett) for 92 points to clench the title with 2477 points.
"Tuff showed me some videos on him, and he looked really good and I was not expecting him to buck that hard and he went right into my hand and felt really good," added the now six time World Champion bull rider from Strong City, Oklahoma.
The number two man coming into Cheyenne, Eli Vastbinder, shined in Cheyenne once again riding four of five of his bulls for the third consecutive year. Vastbinder finished second in the World Finals average race and second in the CBR World Standings after mounting a yearlong crusade of consistency riding 77.71 percent of his bulls in CBR. But the one that got away in round two at 6.07 seconds, 151 Arkansas Flash owned by Williams, Pepper, and Freeman, left him a mere 6 points behind Kimzey in the final tallies.
"I am an Eli fan – he had a great year going toe to toe with Sage - all I can say is my experience – the best thing that ever happened to me was when I blew a World Championship that I had, I learned to never take anything for granted and you have to learn to finish," said Hedeman.
In an intense year of city to city battle, Kimzey finished the year and began the CBR World Finals 266.5 points ahead of Eli Vastbinder. Vastbinder had a stellar World Finals and for the third consecutive year he rode four of his five bulls including a 90.5 on NFR bull 3728 Yellowhair (Hurst) to finished second with 2,471 points.
Kimzey who surpassed Matt Austin's two CBR World titles (2005, 2006) admitted setting records was a goal.
"I love messing with the history books, you know whenever I set out to do this I wanted to be the greatest of all time and that is still my goal and every bull I get on is one step closer to that, I try my heart out every bull I get on and I hopefully by the end of it will all work out," said Kimzey in a post event interview.
