Fred Whitfield Has Big Day
At San Angelo Roping Fiesta

SAN ANGELO — Saturday was a big day for Fred Whitfield. The Hockley, Texas, calf roper clinched wins in both the matched and jackpot calf ropings, something that doesn’t happen very often at San Angelo’s annual Roping Fiesta.

Sunday’s steer roping went to Sonora veteran Arnold Felts, and the junior matched calf roping Sunday fell to Trevor Brazile of Decatur, over Chris Neal of Muldrow, Okla., by 6.54 seconds on eight head.

Whitfield was hot right out of the box Saturday, winning the jackpot’s first go-round with 8.44 seconds, the fastest time of the jackpot. He placed third in the second go and won the short go to take the jackpot average with 27.22 seconds on three head.

He also jumped out to a quick lead in the match against Cody Ohl, Orchard, Texas. Whitfield’s first tie in the 12-head match stopped the clock at 9.9 seconds, almost two and a quarter seconds faster than Ohl’s 12.04 opener.

Ohl came back with 9.8 against 12.61 for Whitfield, gaining a .67-second advantage after two. An 8.97 run for Whitfield regained the lead by three-quarters of a second when Ohl tied in 10.08.

Ohl’s fourth run came in at 8.49 to 10.99 for Whitfield, giving the challenger a lead he didn’t fully relinquish until the next-to-last calf of the match.

At the halfway mark, Ohl held a 2.44-second advantage; Whitfield slashed that lead with a blistering 7.98 seconds on his seventh calf, but he couldn’t erase it. Calf number eight was 9.32 for Ohl and 9.65 for Whitfield, leaving half a second between them.

The two were in the tens on number nine, and Ohl stretched his lead to 2.39 seconds on the tenth calf with 8.76 seconds versus 10.49 for Whitfield. Then an 18.21-second run for Ohl on calf number 11 cost him the lead by a 6.74-second margin as Whitfield tied in 9.08. Ohl tried to come back on the last calf with 8.43, but a careful 11.42 was enough to clinch Whitfield’s win. The final margin was 3.75 seconds, an average of .31 seconds per calf.

Whitfield’s first-go win in the jackpot was followed by Dave Brock, Springtown, with 8.95; Shawn Franklin, Wetumka, Okla., with 8.99; and Neal Felton, Mountain Home, 9.24. The second go went to Keith Hudson, Sonora, with 9.15; James Zant, Harper, 9.43; Whitfield, 9.5; and Ohl, 9.81. Whitfield’s 9.28 in the short go was trailed by Lanham Mangold, Giddings, 9.78; Arnold Felts, 10.06; and David Felton, Weatherford, 11.57.

Following Whitfield in the final money were Franklin, with a total of 31.63 seconds; Felts, with 32.41; and Mangold, with 32.47.

The first go in Sunday’s steer roping went to DeLynn Jones, Hobbs, N.M., with 13.05 seconds, followed by Tee Woolman, Llano, 13.8; J.B. Whatley, Gardendale, 14.12; and J.D. Yates, Pueblo, Colo., 14.18.

Roping legend Roy Cooper, Childress, may be as fast with a knife as he is with with a piggin’ string; when his horse and his steer both tangled and tumbled in the first go-round, Cooper came off the ground with his blade open and cut the treacherous nylon with a single slash.

Arnold Felts won the second steer roping go with 13.06, followed by Jason Evans, Huntsville, 13.93; Bobby Harris, Gillette, Wyo., 14.46; and Marty Jones, Hobbs, N.M., 14.71. The third round went to Jimmy Hodge, Lometa, with 11.87; Buster Record, Buffalo, Okla., 12.18; Cooper, 12.48; and Dan Fisher, Andrews, 12.54. The short go belonged to Tee Woolman with 12.41; J.B. Whatley, 13.4; Jeff Wheelis, Adkins, 13.43; and Gip Allen, Pawhuska, Okla., 13.78.

Arnold Felts took the average with a total time of 57.01 seconds, followed by J.B. Whatley, 62.21; Tee Woolman, 63.62; and Jeff Wheelis, 66.34.