When the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association 2015 season concluded in early December with the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas, one of the sport's stars was missing.

By choice. By principle.  When the 2015 event capped off the most lucrative year in PRCA history with more than $10 million dollars awarded to the NFR qualifiers, Chad Ferley, two-time world champion saddle bronc rider, was at the family ranch in Oelrichs, about as far as possible from the glitter of The Strip and rodeo gold.  The top money earner at this year’s NFR was bareback rider Steven Peeples, who collected more than $234,000. Nine other competitors earned more than $150,000 in the event’s 10-day run, big money indeed in a sport in which the rodeo athletes pay their own way from the word go.  Ferley instead chose to set aside a chance at a third gold buckle, and a possible six-figure payout, to stand by a principle.  The genesis of Ferley's decision came a couple of years ago, when the PRCA introduced a new circuit to the rodeo schedule, the Wrangler Champions Challenge, a series of competitions featuring the sport’s elite, an occurrence not always possible when busy schedules often prevent top hands from appearing in the same performance at the same rodeo.  When the Wranglers Champions Challenge format was announced, PRCA Commissioner Karl Stressman said, "We have a great sport, the original American sport, and we want to showcase our great athletes and stock against each other to give our fans the best possible show.”  At the time, Ferley had no problem with the format.  “I didn’t mind them too much right away when they were just going to have them and the money didn’t count in the standings” to qualify for the NFR, Ferley said.  But the elite who qualified for the Champions Challenge events would skip them, opting instead to compete in simultaneously scheduled rodeos in which prize money earned did count toward year-end standings.  So the PRCA changed the format, counting Champions Challenge earnings.  “I think it probably helped the number of entries since people were more inclined to go to these (the Wrangler Champions Challenge events) when they knew it was going to count toward their world standings, so I’m sure that had a lot to do with it,” said Taryn Cass of the PRCA’s Procom staff.  So Ferley took a stand.  “When they decided to count the money in the (year-end) standings I didn’t agree with that,” Ferley said. “I just felt that it left a lot of guys out of the mix and made it a lot harder for the young guys to get up there (into the top 15 and thereby qualifying for the NFR) when the other guys have such an advantage.”  Despite being one of the “other guys” who stood to profit most by the new format, Ferley chose to pass up a chance at possible big payouts at the 10 Champions Challenge events. He elected to stand up for the little guys, the host of saddle bronc riders not among the elite and thus denied a shot at padding year-end standings with possible Champions Challenge profits.  The result of Ferley’s principled stand: a 16th place finish in the 2015 year-end PRCA standings, $572.62 shy of qualifying for the 2015 NFR qualification, which would have given him an opportunity to add another world championship gold buckle to those he earned in 2006 and 2013.  He also missed a possible six-figure payout.  “I knew it would cost me some money, but I decided that I was probably going to skip most of them, and I did,” Ferley said while enjoying the Christmas holiday with wife, Jessica, and daughters Teigan, 4, and Sawyer, 1. “I only went to one of them (2015 Black Hills Stock Show), and that was because they begged me to go to Rapid City.”  Troy Crowser, a Whitewood native and resident and Chad Ferley’s travel partner in 2015, has little doubt that Ferley would have qualified for the NFR had he chosen to set aside principle for profit.  “You can’t say for sure, of course, but he probably would have won quite a bit of money at the Champions Challenges,” said Crowser who had the misfortune of finishing 16th in 2014 and knows the sting of missing out on a trip to Las Vegas by those precious few dollars. “But they are as unfair as it comes. It allows the top guys who are already doing well have more of a chance than the guys below them, and for Chad to take a stand like that says a lot about the kind of guy he is.”  As for regrets, none at all said Ferley.  “No, no, it is what it is," Ferley said matter-of-factly, clearly comfortable with his choice.  "I had an opportunity to go to more rodeos if I wanted to. I didn’t rodeo terribly hard, I probably entered 60 rodeos, but I probably only went to 35. I could have gone to more rodeos and still been fine. As for the Champions Challenges, I said I wasn’t going to go to them a long time ago, and so I kept my word and didn’t.”