* CFR Performance 1 Preview by Clay Creasy
Rolling into Round 1 of the 2026 CFR!
Last night saw he CPRA host an incredible banquet to celebrate this year’s CFR contestants and year-end award winners. A special congratulations to the Cowboy and Cowgirl of the Year, Ken ‘Goose’ Rehill and Lakota Segboer!
To kick off the 2026 CFR, we will have Aurora Roan singing the anthem while we all celebrate Heritage Night, presented by the River Cree Resort and Casino. Crack out your fringe, turquoise, denim and suede!
Let’s see who has a chance to be the top performers in Go-Round 1 on a Wednesday night:
Bareback Riding
Tonight we see the ‘hopper’ pen, which will give the bareback riders a great chance to show everyone what got them here!
Orin Larsen earned his first career season leader title and will match up against Calgary’s H-52 Harry Money, a younger horse that should help him earn some money!
Coming in right behind Larsen, Ethan Mazurenko will face Vold’s 500 Coconut Valley, a horse decendent of the legendary Grated Coconut that Clint Laye rode for 87 points in Wainwright this year.
Larsen’s travelling partner, 2024 Canadian Champion Kody Lamb, draws another Vold horse, T1 Dancing Queen. Larsen rode the sorrel mare for the Wainwright title with an 89.5-point score, and Lamb himself has had success with her in the past.
Steer Wrestling
With all the timed event competitors running through and sorting the steers and calves into three pens for each event before tonight’s performance, it will be hard to know what they will start with.
If he carries on after sweeping all five rounds in 2025, it won’t matter what steer five-time Canadian champion Scott Guenthner draws on opening night. As he prepares for his final Canadian Finals Rodeo, you can bet the season leader has plans to add to his record-setting regular-season earnings on his way to a record-tying sixth title.
Despite trailing by a considerable margin, Guenthner’s closest competitor, Brendan Laye, grew up down the road and learned the event the same way. Having claimed the 2024 CFR aggregate title, Laye has shown he knows how to put together a tremendous Finals.
After collecting the hardware for the Steer Wrestling and Hazing Horses of the Year last night, Curtis Cassidy will make his 25th appearance at the CFR in the steer wrestling, alongside his 16 previous trips in tie-down roping. The 12-time Canadian Champion will look to get off to a great start!
Novice Bareback Riding
The reigning Canadian Novice Bareback Riding Champion, Quaide Skjonsberg, finds himself drawing up with Vold’s G86 Grey Matter, but it usually doesn’t matter what horse the young cowboy draws, as he’s going to show up with his best!
Novice Saddle Bronc Riding
Season leader Trey Shadlock matches up with Legend Rodeo’s 286 Critical Smile, a paint horse that has taken many of the world’s best cowboys to the pay window, or put them in the dirt. Shadlock looks to get his first CFR off to the right start.
Junior Steer Riding
Reigning steer riding champion and 2026 season leader Ryder Topolinski finds himself getting served a strong one, as Bar C’s H11 Bloody Mary was only ridden twice out of nine trips this season. You can bet that if he’s in the middle at the whistle, we will see a big-time score!
Breakaway Roping
After setting a new breakaway roping regular-season earnings record, Bradi Whiteside will look to get off on the right foot as she works to defend her Canadian Breakaway title.
Despite narrowly missing out on qualifying for this year’s National Finals Breakaway Roping, Jenna Dallyn will come into Rogers Place with authority, as the quiet cowgirl always likes to let her roping speak for her!
Rounding out the top three from the season, Bradi’s older sister Kylie Whiteside knows how to win, and will be looking to catch up to Bradi for both the breakaway and All-Around Cowgirl titles.
Ladies Barrel Racing
With the whole field capable of taking over the lead in the standings with a go-round win on opening night, the event that comes down to thousandths of a second will be made or lost by the tiniest of margins!
Heather Crowley makes her debut at Rogers Place, and will look to stay atop the standings after narrowly claiming the season leader award.
In her rearview mirror, and only $180 behind, sits two-time Canadian champion Taylor Manning, who brings a tremendous amount of past experience despite being only 22 years old!
2025 Canadian Champion Jayden Wilson didn’t run away with the event quite like she did last year, but she will want to show that it doesn’t matter where you start the CFR—it only matters where you finish.
Saddle Bronc Riding
In the saddle bronc riding, they face their toughest challenge on Night 1, with the Eliminator pen bringing the heat!
Reigning six-time champion Zeke Thurston matches up with Calgary’s C-75 Crackin’ the Till, a horse that can try and stretch cowboys out if they don’t keep a hold of the big bay with their feet and rein. Nobody knows how to handle the tough ones better than Thurston, as he looks to get on the board on opening night.
Right behind him, Quinten Taylor faces another Calgary horse that will be one of the toughest draws of the night, C-9 Cloudy Skies, a horse that bucks most cowboys off well before the eight-second whistle. After a tremendous CFR debut in 2025, Taylor looks to rise to this challenge.
Layton Green pairs up with a horse as fierce as Taylor’s in Macza’s 612 Falkland Playboy. The appaloosa bucked Thurston off at last year’s NFR, ending another potential world championship bid. The veteran Green has the tools and mindset to get through this round unscathed.
Team Roping
When you leave Rogers Place as the Canadian Champion and return the next year as season leaders, you can bet that Kash Bonnett and Logan Cullen will plan on starting off their title defence with a go-round win.
In 2025, everything looked to be going the right way for Kavis Drake and Denim Ross after winning the opening round to add to their season-leading earnings. After falling short of a title, they plan on making this year’s CFR go in their favour, and that starts tonight.
Derek Hadland and Jeremy Buhler round out the top three teams at this year’s CFR, and as Hadland looks to build on a solid CFR debut in 2025, his multiple-time Canadian Champion heeler knows what it takes to put together a title-winning week.
Tie-Down Roping
After CFR 2025 didn’t go his way, Canadian Champion Logan Bird got back to work and entered this year’s event in his favourite position, as season leader for the third straight year and sixth overall. Aboard his stalwart buckskin Peso, nobody brings a greater combination of horsepower and preparation to the event than Bird.
Denton Dunham may have narrowly missed the CFR last year, but there was no doubt about his qualification in 2026, coming into this year’s finals in second place. He looks to put his own stamp on the Dunham name alongside his cousin Stran inside Rogers Place.
Although he fell short of a return to Las Vegas, the 2024 CFR aggregate champion, Beau Cooper, had another consistent season on both sides of the border, and will hope to win the opening round like he did at last year’s finals.
Bull Riding
The bull riders will face the toughest pen of bulls for the week on opening night, which is the way they want it!
Lonnie West had an incredibly complete 2026 season on the CPRA and PBR Canada circuits, and everyone knows he’s ready for his opening-night matchup on Vold’s 122 Sylvan Lake RV’s Muffin Man.
The gunslinging Grady Young looks to face off with Legend’s 470 Huckleberry, a bull that went to last year’s NFR. Young wants to leave Edmonton as a Canadian champion, and force his way into next year’s world championships.
Another young star, 19-year-old Holden Atkinson, makes his CFR debut aboard Calgary’s G13 Grand Funk, another bull chosen for the 2025 NFR. After bucking off both cowboys at last year’s CFR, Atkinson plans on breaking that streak tonight.
For the full list of this year’s CFR qualifiers and many more stories, go to
https://rodeocanada.com/canadian-finals-rodeo/
If you want the full schedule of events taking place at Rogers Place and around Edmonton during rodeo weekend, check out the Canadian Finals Rodeo webpage at cfr.ca.