12/12/2025
A recent podcast episode on a different platform stated false information in regards to the most famous bucking bull of all time, J31A Bodacious.
Here's the real story.
J31 Bodacious
1994-1995 PRCA ProRodeo Bull of The Year
1995 PBR Bull of The Year
Bodacious has a really neat story from where he came from to what he became. He not only became a World Champion Bucking Bull, but he was the face of the Rodeo Stock Registry. The marketing of the RSR had fans and people that didnβt even know bull riding, following the career of the big yellow whale.
Jess Kephart had bought a load of Charolais bull calves from a local sale barn to cut and turn out on wheat pasture. There were three bulls on the load that were too poor to cut, Jess was afraid they would die. Time goes on and Jess had started bucking one of those bulls and he was pretty good (not Bodacious). He called Phil Sumner and told him he may have a bull that would work for him and he needed to come look at him. In 1991 Phil and Jason Aduddell went to Jessβs place and bought the one, but there were two other bulls standing there as well, one of those would become Bodacious. Phil Sumner just bought all three of them.
Phil started bucking these bulls at his winter series bull riding quite often. The bull branded J31 had been bucked about 8-10 times and was terrible. They had a novice class coming up and were going to buck him one more time before taking him to the sale barn. He still was terrible, but the kid hung up to him forever. J31 started leaping and blowing in the air trying to get away from the hung up cowboy. Seeing that, Phil decided to keep him and buck him some more. As time goes on, J31 became a feared bull in the IPRA and in 1993 he went to the International Finals Rodeo and they turned him out. Phil Sumner decided that if the guys werenβt going to get on him, he needed to sell him. He sold J31 Bodacious and Tumbleweed to Sammy Andrews in the spring of 1993.
Bodacious became a 2X PRCA Bull of the Year as well as winning PBR Bull of the Year in 1995.
Andrews Rodeo Co retired Bodacious during the NFR in Las Vegas 1995. He would live out the rest of his life on the Andrews ranch in Addielou, Texas. When he passed away, an original bucking chute gate from Rodeo Houston was used as the head stone for his grave.
He was and probably still is the most well known bucking bull on the planet!
