Age: 24
Hometown: Perryton, Texas
Career Earnings: $488,443
2026 World Standings: No. 8, $154,862
Major Rodeos Won: Pendleton Round-Up, National Western Stock Show (co-champ), Lea County PRCA Rodeo, XIT Rodeo & Reunion, World’s Oldest Rodeo
Star Horsepower: Sly Dun Enterprise, “Cornbread”; CDS Spots Move, “Titus”
A fourth-generation Perryton, Texas, cowboy who won a world’s greatest youth horseman title at 16 and set a college finals arena record before he ever turned pro, Trevor Hale has spent 2026 turning that lifetime of horsemanship into a career year—$154,862 won, championships at the Lea County PRCA Rodeo and the XIT Rodeo & Reunion, and a No. 8 spot in the tie-down roping world standings that has him eyeing his first trip to the National Finals Rodeo.
Before Trevor Hale was a calf roper, he was a show-pen kid. His father, Greg Hale, runs a ranch and grew up showing horses; his mother, Cindy Hale, trains them.
“My parents both rode and trained horses,” Hale said, and he grew up at horse shows before drifting to rodeo around age 10 to 12.
The horsemanship came first, and it came fast. At 16, Hale won the inaugural World’s Greatest Youth Horseman at the 2019 NRCHA World’s Greatest Horseman competition, and he stacked up AQHA world championships along the way. He trained under Brad Lund, a team-roping and cow-horse hand, and later went to Cisco College, where he finished reserve at the College National Finals Rodeo in the calf roping. At the 2022 college finals, Hale clocked an arena-record 7.1 seconds—only for Kincade Henry to walk off with the title.
That show-pen background still shapes how he ropes.
“Learning everything I can about a horse, before roping on them, has helped a lot,” Hale said.
Chasing a First NFR
Hale has knocked on the door of the top 15 in the tie-down roping world standings for four straight years. He finished 26th in 2022 with $65,410, climbed to 22nd in 2023 with $91,571, and landed 21st in 2024, a season that included the all-around title at the Home of the Navajo PRCA Rodeo and tie-down wins at the Lea County PRCA Rodeo, the Western Stampede and the Sisters Rodeo.
In 2025 he won the Rooftop Rodeo in Estes Park, Colorado, and the High Desert Stampede in Redmond, Oregon, and split the calf roping at the National Western Stock Show in Denver with Brushton Minton on a 7.3-second run.
“Starting the year with a win, especially on a new horse, is great,” Hale said of the Denver win.
Hale changed his rodeo strategy and approach in 2025 and 2026, and it’s paying off.
“I’m changing how I rodeo this year,” Hale said after the Denver win. “I’ve learned which horses fit which rodeos. Every time I go somewhere I just want to score good, catch and the rest normally just seems to happen.”
The Horsepower
Hale’s string is built the way a horseman builds one. He kicked off his ProRodeo career with Sly Dun Enterprise, “Cornbread,” a dun gelding he bought off a Texas ranch in high school as a head horse and converted almost by accident.
“I tied down calves on that horse two times, and went to a jackpot the third day and won a check on him,” Hale said. “He was really simple to train. I’m not even going to take much of the credit; he trained himself.”
He added CDS Spots Move, “Titus,” acquired from three-time world champion Riley Webb and ridden to the Denver win.