New Focus For 2025 Has Veteran Steer Wrestler In Unfamiliar Territory – On Top

After years of easing around, Levi Rudd is making a push to be among ProRodeo’s elite competitors.

Levi Rudd's early season success has placed him atop the PRCA Steer Wrestling World Standings. | Fernando Sam-Sin/@fsamsin

All it took was a loving nudge for Levi Rudd’s perspective to change. 

For more than a decade, the Chelsea, Okla., native has been a regular steer wrestling competitor in the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association. Unlike many of his peers, Rudd’s approach is sometimes a little more whoa than go. 

This year, things are vastly different. 

“I’ve tried to rodeo a couple times full-time pretty hard and had decent success. But my wife honestly is kind of the reason I am where I am,” Rudd said with a laugh. “I was going to sit on my butt and do the same thing I always do, but she got after me. I went ahead and entered rodeos when everybody else wasn’t and kind of took advantage of the winter and got ahead of the game.”

After the 2024 season ended, Carly Rudd, a Women’s Professional Rodeo Association barrel racer herself, encouraged her husband to switch things up. While other cowboys slowed down in October and November, she advised Levi to pick up the pace. 

And, when the calendar flipped to 2025, the momentum he built at the end of the previous year followed along. 

After some late success in 2024,Levi has continued piling onto his impressive start, recently winning a round at the Fort Worth Stock Show and Rodeo to earn a berth in the semifinals on Friday. 

It’s all added up to put the veteran bulldogger in a position he’s never been in – atop the PRCA World Standings. 

With just shy of $20,000 already to his credit, Levi is in a very unfamiliar spot. Since he started his ProRodeo journey in 2014, he has finished inside the top 50 just three times, with his best season coming in 2018 when he ended up No. 29 with almost $47,000. Last year, Levi completed the campaign unranked with a little more than $35,000 in prize money. 

He got to this point by taking advantage of winter rodeos in late 2024 that many competitors often skip. He picked up checks in October and November, then rolled his way to $9,333 and the California Circuit Finals Rodeo average title just before the new year. This week, he tied with Clayton Hass to win the second round of Bracket 7 in Fort Worth, earning a spot in the upcoming semifinals. 

It’s a different approach from a competitor who admittedly hasn’t pushed himself like most high-level PRCA athletes. While many max out their 85-rodeo limit before the end of the season, Levi generally finishes at around 50 events attended. 

This year, that will be different. 

“(Carly) was like, ‘You need to go ahead and rodeo if you’re going to do it,’” Levi said. “There was one path to do it – go in the winter when nobody else was and be the top money earner for the new year so that was kind of the goal for this year, to get into Houston and it’s just kind of snowballed into what it is.”

It’s a strategy that has worked well thus far, and one Levi won’t be changing anytime soon. 

Being at the front of the pack is certainly a different feeling, one the seasoned steer wrestler is enjoying. He wasn’t quite sure how he would feel if he ever made it to the top spot. Now that he’s here, it’s a vantage point he’d like to keep. 

“It’s weird, but bulldogging from the top I have more confidence than if I had to win. Knowing I need to win to catch up instead of bulldogging to stay ahead, it’s a different way to look at it I guess,” Levi said. “The way it’s going, you can’t back off now.”