OUTLAW PARTNERS
Big Sky PBR just wrapped its biggest weekend yet, and event organizers are already looking ahead. Next summer’s event is set for July 22-24, and if this year’s 15th anniversary edition is any indication, it’s shaping up to be another sellout.
This year’s crowd of nearly 5,000 watched bull rider Kade Madsen become the only rider to win Big Sky twice, riding all four of his bulls to take home $35,942, a custom Gibson guitar and a trip to Turks and Caicos. The championship round delivered four rides over 90 points, a rarity in professional bull riding, including Brady Fielder’s 94.9-point ride and Ezekiel Mitchell’s electric 93-point score aboard Tulsa Time that had the sold-out arena on its feet. PBR CEO Sean Gleason, who has spent 27 years with the organization, called it a “Top 10 event.”
Beyond the dirt, the weekend’s 10 days of events raised more than $800,000 for causes including the Epilepsy Foundation of Montana, Big Sky Bravery, Warriors and Quiet Waters, Big Sky Search and Rescue, the Taco Dowler Youth Foundation and Montana State Athletics, with National Champion Bobcat football players storming the arena on Montana State University night. It’s a mix of world-class competition and community giving that keeps people coming back to Big Sky PBR year after year.
Longtime supporters, some who’ve been at the event since its inaugural year in 2011, say the pull goes beyond the eight-second rides.
“We’re celebrating the West by having an authentic group of athletes and the support that comes with bringing the PBR to Big Sky. It brings back the romance of the cowboy, and that makes everybody feel good,” said Martha Johnson, a Big Sky resident of four decades and local real estate broker. She says introducing newcomers to the PBR experience often reignites their connection to the community.
Steve Anglin, co-founder of Smith Anglin Financial, brings his whole family every summer. “It combines Montanans, tourists, cowboys and people of Western heritage. It’s an amalgamation of people in an outdoor arena. The energy it brings—you don’t want to not be there,” he said, adding that his kids look forward to it more than Christmas or Thanksgiving.
From a bulldozed sagebrush field with hay-bale seating in 2011 to a sold-out arena drawing fans from across the country today, Big Sky PBR has earned its reputation as a premier summer tradition, voted PBR’s Event of the Year 12 years running by the cowboys themselves.
”We knew once people saw it, they would love it,” said Megan Paulson, co-founder and CMO of Outlaw Partners said of those early days of Big Sky PBR. The bet paid off: when the event expanded from one night to three, it kept selling out, and today roughly 70% of attendees travel from outside Montana to be there.
Scissorbills Saloon owner Michelle Clark-Conley has watched the transformation firsthand. “It was a much smaller rodeo then, but everything in Big Sky was smaller then,” she said. “I feel like PBR has grown with the town.”
Fifteen years later, that growth shows no signs of slowing. Join Outlaw Partners and Freestone Productions next July 22-24, 2027, at the Big Sky Events Arena to do it all again.
