Fort Worth Freestyle to take place during PBR World Finals in Will Rogers Event Tent and Cowtown Coliseum
FORT WORTH, Texas — With over $140,000 up for grabs, Tucker Lane knows he needs a big showing this week at the Fort Worth Freestyle in order to stake his claim at, or near, the top of the Ultimate Bullfighters (UBF) World Standings.
In 2021, Lane was in contention for the UBF World Title, ranking inside the top three ahead of the World Finals in Fort Worth at Cowtown Coliseum. An unfortunate ankle injury however had him on the sidelines on crutches and in the press box, out of competition.
Knox Dunn, now also out due to injury, would wind up the World Champion.
“It’s definitely a day by day thing,” Lane said of his ankle today. “There are days when I wake up and feel really good and I know that I can compete at a very high level. Then there are days that I don’t know what I’ve got in the tank as far as my ankle goes. I came back to my first event in Clayton, Georgia and placed third in the event. It was a really cool thing to make it back to where I was at.”
Not having qualified for the final weekend and big money at the Fort Worth Freestyle, Lane will have to leave the first two days of Wildcard competition in the top two or three spots in order to qualify for the second semifinal weekend.
“I went to Fort Worth for the qualifier event and didn’t have the endurance to fight a fourth bull so that cost me a bit that week,” Lane said of the UBF and PBR’s Bulls Gone Wild event series this spring. “I just have to take it slow, take time off and take care of myself in a way I have never had to before. I have to be smart and I have to make business decisions.”
Even second place in Fort Worth over the next ten days pays as much ($25,000) as the 2021 World Champion bonus. This week’s Freestyle Bullfighting event is the richest in the sports history.
“I think it takes our sport to a whole new level to have a stand-alone that pays this much money,” Lane said. “When you start adding this kind of money, it’s taking things to a global stage and it’s always been a dream of ours to be on a stage like that.
“I think that the UBF has done a great job in elevating not just our brand but the whole sport to a level we were never sure we could get to. It’s pretty awesome to be a part of it, I’m on the poster for the PBR World Finals, even though it’s something that’s so little it’s something that a few years ago seemed like would never happen.
“I’m just excited to be a part of an organization that makes us feel and look like rock stars.”
Lane runs in a tight circle with the 2020 UBF World Champion Chance Moorman who wound up second to Dunn in 2021.
“Chance and I, we kind of have this agreement to where we’re always brutally honest with each other, we don’t always see things the way the judges see them,” Lane said. “Sometimes Chance wins and I’ll let him know: ‘Hey you could have done this better’ or I’ll win and he’ll let me know I could have done a little better, it’s just the respect we have for each other and making sure we are always holding each other to the highest standard.
“We were both the new guys on tour in in 2018 we both took the world by storm that year. It’s been quite a journey seeing the two of us come from a bunch of nobodies to being guys that now set the standard. It’s pretty cool and I’d like to think a lot of that is because we have held each other to such high expectations.”
With the extreme variety of freestyle bullfighting, athletes must pick and choose their bouts and where they spend their time and efforts.
“It’s not always the easiest to decide what bull fights I can go to and what bull fights I can’t,” Lane said. “But when you have a bull fight like this where there’s so much money added, you kind of have to forget about all of that.
“Whether I’m on a bum ankle or not, they have to pay out that money to somebody and for $50,000 I could go buy myself a new one.”
REAM MORE: Fort Worth Freestyle Qualifiers and Contenders
Through four days of competition, 33 of the best bullfighters on the planet are set to assemble in the Lone Star State outside Will Rogers Coliseum on May 13th, 14th, 20th with the finale taking place on May 21st starting 10:30pm inside the historic Cowtown Coliseum.
The first weekend, 15 challengers fight for their share of $20,000 in the Fort Worth Freestyle Wildcard Rounds with the top two or three, barring a potential injury replacement, advancing to the second weekend dubbed the Fort Worth Freestyle Semifinal Rounds where the 15 seeded athletes have already staked their claim.
On Day 1 of the second weekend, May 20th, all 18 will fight one bull with the top 12 advancing to Saturday, May 21st back at Cowtown Coliseum. After a first round of head to head matches, the top six will fight one more bull their share of a $100,000 Saturday night purse, with $50,000 being awarded to the No. 1 man.
It all starts this Friday afternoon at 3:00pm outside Dickies Arena at the Will Rogers Tent.
For tickets, merchandise, standings and more information, visit UltimateBullfighters.com
About Ultimate Bullfighters Inc. (UBF): Founded in 2008 by J.B. Mauney, Luke Kaufman and Chad Ellison; was created over a decade ago to promote the sport of freestyle bullfighting. In the action-packed sport of freestyle bullfighting, a bullfighter competes for 60 seconds against a fighting bull predominantly of Spanish descent in an effort to score points for maneuvers performed during the competition. Unlike traditional bullfighting, the animals are not harmed or killed. Bullfighters are judged solely on their ability to perform dangerous stunts as close to the bull as possible without getting hit. Having paid out over $1,000,000 since formation and over $500,000 in the past two seasons, UBF embarks on a new journey with a historic partnership with both the Professional Bull Riders (PBR) and Fort Worth, Texas including the UBF World Finals and an event series beginning in March 2022. For more, visit UltimateBullfighters.com