Trevor Kastner Bullrider caps 2022 regular season with Pasadena title

A trip to the 2022 Wrangler National Final Rodeo presented by Teton Ridge was not on Trevor Kastner’s list of goals 12 months ago. A veteran of fifteen years in ProRodeo and earner of $1 million, Kastner was content with life at home with his family and traveling lightly to get on bulls here and there.

But the wins piled up all summer and Kastner is coasting into the final days of the season ranked sixth in the PRCA | RAM World Standings thanks to wins like the Pasadena (Texas) Livestock Show & Rodeo on Sept. 29.

The final week of Kastner’s regular season included a win in Omaha, Neb., a third-place finish in Oklahoma City, and the 89-point effort in Pasadena aboard Universal Rodeo’s Chanler’s Dream, checks that totaled $10,918 in three eight-second bull rides.

“This past month’s been good, I can’t complain for sure,” Kastner, 34, said.
After a good showing at the 2021 RAM Prairie Circuit Finals Rodeo last October, Kastner hit the big winter stock show rodeos, earning third in San Antonio. He plucked around closer to home, winning Woodward, Okla. in June and made a modest Fourth of July run.

But it was in mid-July when the goals began to change.

“I started out just easing around and not planning to try to go to the Finals,” Kastner said. He was enjoying time at home with wife Kate and daughter McKenna, 4, and son Korbyn, 2. “Then I won a good bit out of Spanish Fork.”

In fact, Kastner collected $22,505 for the Xtreme Bulls win there, a huge shot in the arm to his season.

“My wife and I had a good talk after that and decided that I would try it out,” he noted.
The checks kept adding up and Kastner was well over $100,000 won when he arrived in South Texas as the season closed out in late September.

Riding on the final night of the rodeo in Pasadena, Kastner got on a bull he didn’t know in Chanler’s Dream.

“I actually didn’t know what he was,” Kastner said. “He was out to the left a couple jumps and then back to the right. It was good.”

As one of only three men to make qualified rides, Kastner picked up a nice check worth $4,010, including the ground money.

Kastner will make his seventh appearance at the Wrangler NFR in December and first since 2020 after missing the cut at 23rd a year ago. He’s got one last out for his 2022 season, the Xtreme Bulls event in Pasadena on September 30, before he’ll head home to Roff, Okla., for some much-needed time off the road.

“I’ll take a pretty good break and spend time with my family,” Kastner said. “I ride quite a few horses when I’m home, colts, so I’ll try not to change up too much.”

As one of the oldest riders amongst the NFR qualifiers, Kastner notes his motivation to keep going and winning is simple.

“My wife and kids,” he said. “Knowing this is how I provide for them is my biggest motivation.”

Other winners at the $87,925 rodeo were all-around cowboys Kade Sonnier and Mason Stuller ($443, bareback and tie down roping and bareback and saddle bronc riding); bareback rider Leighton Berry (88.5 points on Frontier Rodeo’s Night Fist); steer wrestler JD Struxness (6.9 seconds on two head); team ropers Dustin Egusquiza and Travis Graves (8.1 seconds on two head); saddle bronc rider Brody Cress (87 points on Frontier Rodeo’s Too Good); tie-down roper Connor Atkinson (8.1 seconds); and barrel racer Kendall Purgatono (15.67 seconds).

The information enclosed in this release is courtesy of the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (PRCA)