For decades, rodeo has trusted the same wives tale: Whatever is sitting fifth in the world standings when the Cheyenne Frontier Days wraps up is what it will take to make the NFR.
But what does that actually mean? Does the team sitting fifth have enough won to coast into December, or is the fifth-place money simply a good estimate of what it will ultimately take to finish No. 15?
The answer has always been a little bit of both.
When we first broke down the old wives’ tale in 2022, three-time World Champion Tee Woolman explained that, after years of watching the standings, cowboys noticed the money won by No. 5 after Cheyenne was usually close to the eventual NFR cutoff.
“I don’t know if it’s halfway there or what, but usually whatever is fifth after Cheyenne is what it takes to make the Finals,” Woolman said in 2022. “It could be a touch less or a touch more.”
Restated as math, fifth-place earnings the week after Cheyenne should land close to 15th-place earnings at the end of the regular season, give or take. But as recent history has it, a team sitting fifth probably shouldn’t turn out just yet.
The 2024 season was a pretty good year for the rule.
After Cheyenne, Jake Smith and Douglas Rich were fifth in the world standings with $98,865.71 each. When the regular season ended, the actual cutoff came in $6,202.84 higher for the headers and $10,046.56 higher for the heelers with Derrick Begay at 15th on the head side with $105,068.55 and Paul Eaves 15th in the heeling with $108,912.27.
The old rule wasn’t exact, but it wasn’t far off, either. A guy with fifth-place money after Cheyenne still needed to keep winning, but he certainly didn’t need to set the world on fire over the final two months.
Then came 2025.
Tyler Wade and Wesley Thorp were fifth after Cheyenne with $85,828.19 each. By the end of the regular season, however, it took Lightning Aguilera’s $116,864.30 to make the Finals heading and Jonathan Torres’ $111,680 to make it heeling.
The rule missed by $31,036.11 on the head side and $25,851.81 on the heel side. Put another way, fifth-place money after Cheyenne fell 36% short of the final heading cutoff and 30% short of the heeling cutoff.
That’s the difference between parking the truck in August and watching the Finals on television.
One wrinkle: The identical heading and heeling figures aren’t typos. Fifth heading and fifth heeling were partners in both years—Smith and Rich in 2024, followed by Wade and Thorp in 2025. Sometimes the rule’s starting point is one team’s season counted twice.
Why Is the Rule Missing?
The rule assumes Cheyenne represents roughly the halfway point of the season’s money. It still falls in the same week of July, but it may no longer represent the same share of the money available.
Clay Tryan called that possibility four years ago.
“The rodeos pay so much better at the end than they used to,” Tryan, ProRodeo’s all-time winningest team roper, said in 2022. “It always took $60-$70,000, but all it takes is the guy at No. 14 or No. 15 to win Puyallup or Pendleton, and things get more interesting.”
The NFR cutoff has climbed accordingly.
In 2023, Luke Brown finished No. 15 among headers with $97,752, while Tyler Worley grabbed the final heeling qualification with $93,983. By 2025, those numbers had climbed to $116,864.30 and $111,680, respectively.
That’s an increase of $19,112.30 on the head side and $17,697 on the heel side in two seasons. Both cutoffs have grown by an average of about 9% per year.
For another comparison, the final heading spot cost Jake Cooper $73,190.95 in 2019. Cheyenne hasn’t moved on the calendar. The amount of money still left to win after it has.
So What Does It Take in 2026?
After Cheyenne in 2026, Aguilera is fifth in the heading with $105,931.27, while Ross Ashford is fifth among heelers with $98,538.37.
Aguilera already has more won than it took to make the Finals heading in 2023 and 2024, but he remains $10,933.03 short of the 2025 cutoff.
Ashford is ahead of the 2023 heeling cutoff, but he is $10,373.90 short of the 2024 mark and $13,141.63 behind what it took in 2025.
If the cutoffs continue growing at roughly 9% per year, it would take approximately $127,000 to qualify heading and $122,000 heeling in 2026. That’s only a projection, and two seasons aren’t enough to establish a new rodeo rule of thumb. But both estimates land roughly $20,000 beyond where the old Cheyenne rule points.
There is a neat irony in the header column, too. Aguilera is this year’s No. 5. He was also last year’s No. 15—the $116,864.30 that showed just how far the old rule could miss was his.
If the old wives’ tale is true, Aguilera and Ashford have the Finals made. If the last two years have taught us anything, though, it’s that they shouldn’t head home and kick their feet up just yet.
Martin Lucero’s advice from the original 2022 analysis may be more useful than any exact number.
“You don’t have to win first every time to make the Finals,” Lucero said. “You could make good runs, maintain your horse, maintain your sanity and still make the Finals.”
The rule was never really about the number. It was about knowing when a cowboy could breathe.
What changed is that the season may no longer let him breathe in August.