Recent Winners in St. Louis Have Been Part of World Title Picture

By: Darci Miller

PUEBLO, Colo. – This weekend, the 2024 Unleash The Beast season continues with the PBR St. Louis on Dec. 2-3 (Dec. 2 at 7:45 p.m. ET on RidePass on Pluto TV).

It’s just the second event of the nascent 2024 season, and the world title picture is sure to change significantly as the season progresses.

But… will it?

Looking back on results of the PBR’s past few trips to the Gateway to the West, a pattern jumps out: most of the winners are part of the world title picture that year.

Coincidence? Maybe, maybe not. But any way you slice it, keep an eye on the winner of the PBR St. Louis this weekend, because he very well could be in the hunt for a gold buckle come the PBR World Finals in Fort Worth, Texas, in May.

PAST WINNERS IN ST. LOUIS

2023: Cooper Davis

While the 2016 World Champion is now retired from the Unleash The Beast to focus on making a run for the PBR Camping World Teams Championship with the Carolina Cowboys, he was still at the top of his game in 2023. He began the season riding as well as he ever had, going 5-for-6 through the first two events with a dominating win in St. Louis.

Davis would go on to win one other event and go 23-for-53 (43%) with one 90-point ride, sitting at No. 4 in the Unleash The Beast World Championship standings heading into the 2023 PBR World Finals. Despite a very strong season, a disappointing 1-for-7 performance at the World Finals dashed his hopes of a second gold buckle, and he finished the season ranked No. 9.

 

2022: Daylon Swearingen

2022 was an absolute dream year for Daylon Swearingen and was truly his PBR coming-out party.

After an underwhelming 2021 season that saw him finish No. 32 in the world, 2022 couldn’t have been more different. Swearingen recorded nine 90-point rides and won two events, including in St. Louis in February, before going on to win the 2022 PBR World Finals en route to becoming the 2022 PBR World Champion.

You could make the argument that Swearingen’s run to his world title started in St. Louis.

2020: Jose Vitor Leme

2020 may have been a pretty strange year, but it did set one precedent: Jose Vitor Leme entrenched firmly at the top of the world standings. In his first world title year, Leme went a stunning 44-for-65 (67%) with nine 90-point rides and seven event wins.

Of course, these are all marks he would eclipse in 2021, but at the time, 2020 was Leme’s best season. His win in St. Louis was his third of the season – just one stop on Leme’s road to greatness.

 

2019: Chase Outlaw

We haven’t seen a healthy Chase Outlaw in an unfortunate few years now, but back in 2019, he was pretty much on top of the world. He was a key factor in one of the tightest world title races in recent memory, locked in a season-long battle with Jose Vitor Leme, Joao Ricardo Vieira and eventual World Champion Jess Lockwood.

Outlaw ultimately finished the season ranked No. 3, and what a season it was. He went 47-for-94 (50%) with eight 90-point rides, winning four events. His win in St. Louis in February was his first of the year – fittingly, the event was named for Outlaw’s good friend Mason Lowe, who tragically passed away after a wreck a month prior.

Outlaw would go on to have another emotional win that season, taking the victory in Cheyenne, Wyoming, exactly a year after a wreck nearly ended his career in the very same place.

He may not have won the world title that season, but if there was a season of Outlaw, this was it.

 

2018: Tanner Byrne

The lone exception to the trend, Canadian Tanner Byrne was not in the world title picture in 2018 – he finished the year ranked No. 27 in the world standings, and actually retired the following year to pursue a bullfighting career in Canada. His win in St. Louis was the second and final of his premier series career.

2017: Kaique Pacheco

Since Kaique Pacheco debuted in the United States in 2014, it’s been extremely rare for him not to be a central figure in a world title race. He ranked No. 3 in 2015, No. 2 in 2016, and No. 5 in 2017, when he earned his victory in St. Louis – his first of two that season.

2017 may not have been Pacheco’s year, but 2018 certainly was. He started the season hot, winning the first event of the year and never looking back. He was so far ahead in the world standings at the end of the season that No. 2 Leme couldn’t catch him, even after Pacheco badly injured his knee days before the World Finals. He needed just two rides at the World Finals to clinch the world title.

Photo courtesy of Andy Watson/Bull Stock Media

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