No. 2 | $193,807
- Age: 25
- Hometown: Angleton, Texas
- Career earnings: $653,532
- NFR Qualifications: 3 (2022-2023, 2025)
- NFR Average Titles: 1 (2022)
- Major ropings: Lone Star Shootout, USTRC U.S. Open
- Major rodeos: NFR, Fort Worth Stock Show & Rodeo, Cody Stampede (Wyoming)
- Star Horsepower: Marshall (Missn Cowboy Sioux), Freightliner (DCC Colonel Cat)
- Rope Choice: Lone Star Frio S / MS
Tanner Tomlinson’s career as a professional header all falls back on a 2019 win in Corpus Christi, Texas.
The then 19-year-old had just made the switch from the heel side to the quarterback role, looking to try something new. That win set everything in motion, pushing him to buy his PRCA card the following year in 2020.
“I actually heeled my entire life,” Tomlinson said in 2022 before his first NFR. “I won a truck heeling when I was 12 years old, then when I got to be about a #8 heeler, I started heading in the lower-numbered ropings. I was a 9+ heeler when I turned 17.”
As a kid, Tomlinson grew up just outside of Houston in a family of team ropers and raising roping steers. Rope in hand since a young kid, Tomlinson learned to rope from his dad Steve, older brother Justin and grandpa Willy.
In 2020, with one season under his belt as a header, Tomlinson finished his breakout PRCA season with $22,534.24, earning him the Resistol Rookie Header of the Year title. He picked up two-time World Champ Patrick Smith in 2021 and, in 2022, he’d shout from the rooftop at the Thomas & Mack Center in December at his very first NFR.
That same year, Tomlinson and Smith won seven go-round checks and set the NFR team roping aggregate record at 53.00 on 10 steers. Tomlinson was perfect in his first Las Vegas appearance, spinning 10 out of 10 steers, with no barriers at that. Collecting $199,726 a man at the NFR alone, Tomlinson and Smith also set an NFR team roping earnings record.
In 2023, Tomlinson qualified for his second NFR with Smith and ended the season 12th in the PRCA world standings with $181,204.
Tomlinson is currently roping with Travis Graves in 2025, kicking the year off with the Fort Worth Stock Show & Rodeo win for $25,350 a man. He currently sits No. 2 in the world with $193,807 won heading to his third NFR.
But in a million years, I didn’t dream my first Finals would go like it did. I knew if I got tapped off, it would go good. But I couldn’t have planned for it or had it go better than it did. It’s still a blur in my mind. For us to come so close to winning the world, and have it come down to the last steer—it’s going to be tough to top my first one.
Tanner Tomlinson, 2023
More with Tanner Tomlinson
- Tanner Tomlinson Takes Over 2025 PRCA World Standings
- Tomlinson’s Marshall Makes Mighty Post-Colic Comeback
- Tanner Tomlinson, Travis Graves Stretch Final Steer for Fort Worth Win, $25,350 Each
- Tanner Tomlinson’s Confidence Game
- Tomlinson and Smith Break NFR Aggregate Record On Way to Res. World Title
- Tanner Tomlinson and Patrick Smith Clinch 2022 NFR Average Title in Round 9
- Tanner Tomlinson Takes Aim at First Trip to NFR
- Reigning Resistol Rookie of the Year Tomlinson’s Advice to Future Contenders
- A Battle to the End: Tanner Tomlinson Crowned 2020 Resistol Rookie Header of the Year
