Mayfield Overcomes Injury, Embraces Legends of the NFR

Via the Gold Buckle Buzz series, writer Brian Hurlburt takes us into the minds and hearts of the PRCA World Champions who clinched titles during the 2024 Wrangler National Finals Rodeo® in addition to several 1985 PRCA World Champions. 

Here we go with a very special 2025 Gold Buckle Buzz Series when we interview the 2024 PRCA World Champions and the 1985 World Champions, when available. The 2025 series is part of a year-long special celebration of the 40^th anniversary of the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas.

It will all culminate with the Wrangler National Finals Rodeo Dec. 4-13, 2025 at the world-famous Thomas & Mack Center in fabulous Las Vegas.

Shad Mayfield earned his first PRCA All-Around World Championship in 2024 to go along with a 2020 Tie-Down Roping World Championship. In 1985, the legendary Lewis Feild earned his first All-Around championship.

Feild passed away in 2016, but the thrills he gave rodeo fans still reverberate each December throughout the Thomas & Mack Center

Mayfield earned his All-Around title despite dealing with injuries in his hips throughout the 2024 season. In fact, his 2025 season was in jeopardy when surgery seemed the only remedy. But he met with Dr. Thomas Byrd, Team Orthopedic Surgeon for the Tennessee Titans, and he has been rodeoing at a high level ever since. 

As of June 20, he was ranked second in the Tie-Down Roping World Standings, about $18,000 behind 2024 PRCA World Champion Riley Webb. Mayfield, however, was not listed in the All-Around rankings.

Mayfield appreciates Feild and the other legends who paved the way, including his father, Sylvestor. Mayfield reminisced during an Wrangler NFR promotional day in May at the South Point.

“This year will be legendary as we honor the 40 years of the NFR in Vegas,” Mayfield said. “That first year in Las Vegas is very special to me because that is also the first year my dad qualified for the NFR. He was the first African-American cowboy to make the NFR in my event. To bring back each of the legends today, and then also later during the NFR, is awesome. I am honored to be here and be around them. They set the stage for us to do what we are doing and allow us to make such a good living at it.”

Feild is surely looking down from the rodeo heavens and loving what he sees, and how rodeo and the NFR have reached tremendous new heights. The shadow of the ProRodeo Hall of Famer is long. He has a seemingly never ending list of accomplishments.

Feild won his first All-Around title at the 1985 NFR and was the first roughstock cowboy to do so since Larry Mahan in 1973. Feild went on to win three straight All-Around titles and two Bareback Riding crowns. In 1990, he became the first roughstock contestant with $1 million in career earnings.

Because of his prowess in both the roughstock and timed events, he won the distinguished Linderman Award three times, in 1981, 1988 and 1991. 

In his ProRodeo Hall of Fame Bio, this quote is attributed to the gritty Feild, father of 6-time PRCA World Champion Kaycee Feild. 

“Someday, when rodeo people look back at what I’ve done, I’d like them to say these things: that I rode tough; that I could ride with pain and courage; that I was a fierce competitor in the arena, but a quiet, respectable man outside the gate. I just want to be remembered as a cowboy. That probably says it all.”

As we celebrate 40 years of the NFR in Vegas, Mr. Feild, the Cowboy, will surely be remembered and on the minds of thousands of fans and competitors.

And Mayfield should be front and center, chasing another Gold Buckle.