The way the 2026 season is shaping up, the WPRA world title is anybody’s to win.
If 2025 proved anything, it is that the barrel race is not over until the tenth round in Las Vegas. T
he NFR opened in chaos — an EHV-1 outbreak scrambled the barrel horses in the days before the finals. Kassie Mowry’s own CP He Will Be Epic had to shake the virus before winning Round 1, and she spent the middle of the finals aboard a borrowed “Cornbread” (Heavens Got Credit) — and still she could not be beaten.
She was not uncatchable, either. Tricia Aldridge walked into the Thomas & Mack 11th in the world and walked out the reserve champion, banking $245,384.64 over 10 rounds to finish her season at $386,566.64.
A single round win paid $36,667.95 last year.
Six over $100K — in July
That backdrop frames the 2026 race. After Calgary—where 100% of the money counts toward the world standings this year—BarrelRacing.com’s unofficial projected standings show six women over $100,000: Mowry ($162,332.69), Hayle Gibson-Stillwell ($147,804.50), Hailey Kinsel ($146,407.11), Emily Beisel ($133,915.17), Carlee Otero ($132,590.35) and Michelle Alley ($113,712.94). Six six-figure earners in the middle of July is deep company — but the real story is not how many have crossed $100,000. It is how little separates them.
A tightening top three
The story at the very top is how close it is. Mowry still leads, but her cushion is barely $14,500 — and Gibson-Stillwell and Kinsel are separated by less than $1,400. Kinsel is the reason the top three tightened: her $66,250 week in Calgary, capped by the $50,000 Showdown win aboard Sis, launched her from ninth to third. Beisel and Otero both sit north of $130,000, and Alley is knocking on the door at $113,712.94.
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A very different July than last year
The clearest measure is last season at the same stage. On July 22, 2025 — also just after Calgary — seven women had crossed $100,000, and the 15th projected spot sat at $64,492. The 2026 field looks much the same: six over six figures, with the 15th spot near $63,000. The depth, in other words, is a match. The change is entirely at the front.
A year ago, Mowry ($180,695) and Brittany Pozzi Tonozzi ($152,552) had opened a two-woman breakaway — Mowry led by better than $28,000, and the top three were spread across more than $60,000. This year that lead is roughly half as large and the top three fit inside $16,000, with the top five separated by about $30,000. Where 2025 had a runaway, 2026 has a scrum. The board turns over fast, too: last July’s runner-up, Pozzi Tonozzi, sits outside the top 15 now, and Aldridge—ninth at this stage in 2025— rode a torrid NFR to the reserve title.
The Playoff Series is the late-season weapon
The World Standings are not the only board that matters—and the second one reframes the first. Through the Cowboy Christmas rodeos, the WPRA Playoff Series points race (updated July 8) is led by Emily Beisel (896.13) and Hayle Gibson-Stillwell (881.26), with Carlee Otero third and Mowry fourth. Sitting near the top there is a weapon: it lines a rider up for the season’s richest playoff paydays — the Sioux Falls Governor’s Cup alone carried $155,555.55 in added money last year, with Puyallup still to come — and that money counts toward the world.
The flip side is just as telling. Two of the women crowding the world’s top six — Michelle Alley (19th in Playoff points) and Hailey Kinsel (20th) — sit well back in the Playoff Series. Much of their climb has come on the open road and at Calgary rather than through the playoff pipeline, which means the sport’s biggest late-season checks are, for now, lined up in front of Beisel and Gibson-Stillwell instead. In a race this tight, which contenders hold the bigger late-season lever may be what decides it.
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Anything can change in Vegas
Recent history backs it up. In 2024, the world title came down to a Kinsel–Mowry duel that ran to the tenth round; in 2025, Aldridge’s NFR run turned a runaway into a two-woman finish. Anything can change in Las Vegas — and with the gap between Mowry and the field shrinking by the week, the 2026 world title is shaping up to be exactly what the standings say it is: anybody’s game.
And these numbers are pre–NFR Open: Beisel is already leading Set 1 of that $85,300 event in Colorado Springs, so the board is about to move again as July rodeos keep rolling
Unofficial Projected WPRA World Standings as of July 16, 2026
1. Kassie Mowry | $162,332.69
2. Hayle Gibson-Stillwell | $147,804.50
3. Hailey Kinsel | $146,407.11
4. Emily Beisel | $133,915.17
5. Carlee Otero | $132,590.35
6. Michelle Alley | $113,712.94
7. LaTricia Duke | $96,182.58
8. Tayla Moeykens | $83,497.57
9. Austyn Tobey | $80,432.54
10. Sydney Graham | $80,343.57
11. Makenzie Mayes | $70,713.27
12. Katelyn Scott | $65,559.68
13. Summer Kosel | $64,993.23
14. Julie Plourde | $64,517.82
15. Kathy Grimes | $63,000.54
16. Lisa Lockhart | $56,977.75
17. Megan McLeod-Sprague | $55,379.57
18. Brittany Pozzi Tonozzi | $52,267.80
19. Morgan Bagnell | $52,122.70
20. Tricia Aldridge | $51,065.82
21. Anita Ellis | $51,014.75
22. Gracen Harman | $50,472.16
23. Acey Pinkston | $49,396.67
24. Lindsey Muggli | $49,037.11
25. Alyssa Urbanek-Wade | $48,864.56