The Big Lid

Liddon Cowden Memorial Roping

A cousin who roped with him at the NFR. A son who carries his name. Both of them left The Big Lid with a check.

Written by Dee Yates

The 2nd Annual Liddon Cowden Memorial Roping ran August 15, 2026, at Riverside Rancheros in Riverside, California, and the day ended about the way Liddon Cowden would have wanted it to. His cousin Cody Cowden and Will Cowden won the LCM Open, 31.43 on four head, $1,025 per man. Cody Cowden and Blake VanStavern won the Open Draw as well, 32.22 on four. Colt Cowden, Liddon’s son, and VanStavern were second in that one at 32.60, and Colt and VanStavern had already won the first round with a 5.94.

They call it The Big Lid.

Cody Cowden is the man Liddon roped with at the 1993 National Finals Rodeo. The two cousins placed in three rounds that year and finished second in the average with a 106.6-second time on ten head. Thirty-three years later he backed into the box at his cousin’s roping and won it.

Liddon Todd Cowden was born October 27, 1970, in Merced, California, the son of the late Sonny Cowden, an NFR header himself, and Donna Cowden. He had two brothers, Scott and Ace, and a sister, Mindy. He was 54 when he passed on January 1, 2025, in Las Vegas. He is survived by his four sons, Mason, Chase, Colt and Lane, and by his first grandchild, Colt’s baby, who arrived right around that same time.

Ponies, Angus and Hog Head

The roping came first and it came early. Brent Lockett, who would go on to be Liddon’s partner at his last NFR, remembers walking into the Cowden place as a boy and finding six or seven Shetland ponies tied to the fence with little saddles on them, some of them fitted with metal horns like the ones on pony rides. Liddon rode outside ponies for people and sometimes took hay in trade for the work. Sonny ranched, and he kept little three-hundred-pound Angus cattle around so his son had something to rope off those ponies. Wes Goodrich, who grew up alongside Liddon the way their fathers Ron Goodrich and Sonny Cowden had grown up alongside each other, remembers Liddon bringing cattle up the arena all day at the Chowchilla Stampede on a pony named Hog Head, roping them every trip back. Goodrich roped with him at his first junior rodeo in Merced when Liddon was about eight years old.

He started out on the heel side. That changed at the 1989 National High School Finals Rodeo, where he and Daniel Green were roping together with Liddon on the heel side, and somebody named Jason Hershberger put him on a head horse at the jackpots. Goodrich says that week was when Liddon found out what he was. The next year he was heading at the National Finals Rodeo.

Four Trips to the NFR

He won the 1990 Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association Team Roping Rookie of the Year award, back when the honor covered both ends and heading and heeling rookies were not yet recognized separately. He and Walt Rodman went to that first NFR together and won Round 2 with a 5.4. In 1993 he went back with Cody. In 1996 he and Brent Lockett won Round 3 with a 4.8, placed in five rounds, and Liddon finished the year seventh in the world with $57,602, the best season of his career.

He and Lockett won the Pendleton Round-Up twice, in 1996 and again in 2002, when the two of them were 18.7 on three head. He and Cody won the Dodge City Roundup back to back in 1992 and 1993. He and Tommye Flenniken won George Aros’s big roping in Tubac, Arizona.

Ropers who watched him work say he studied H.P. Evetts and taught himself to copy that reach, and that he came by his head swing naturally. When Speed Williams arrived, there were people who thought the two of them looked alike coming across the line. Goodrich says Liddon could swing it over the gates and reach.

The 1996 run to the Finals is the part of the story his friends still tell on each other. He and Lockett entered a hundred rodeos that year. Neither man had a driver’s license. Both had lost the credit privileges on their PRCA cards for bouncing a check, which meant a full year of paying entry fees in cash, wired through Western Union to the office by the second business day after each rodeo. So the week had a shape to it. Win something first. Then find somebody willing to cash the check without an ID. Then find a Western Union. They were not in the standings at all until September, and then they went to Puyallup and won it, went to Lewiston and won it, went to Othello and won it, won Pendleton, and came home to California and won Barstow.

That Pendleton win carried more than money. Mike Boothe, who had roped with Lockett at the 1993 and 1994 Finals, was lost after a fall on the Pendleton grass in 1995. Liddon and Brent stood up and spoke at his funeral, then went back the following fall and won the rodeo that had taken him.

Lockett’s own milestones are stitched to Liddon’s. The first time he was ever four on a team roping steer, he and Liddon did it together at Larsen’s Arena in Ceres, California. The first time he was ever five, same two men. His first three-second run came with Liddon in the semifinals at Dallas in 2002, a 3.7 that split with Wade Wheatley and Kyle Lockett, Brent’s little brother.

Rated R

The rest of it is the part that made him a legend around Merced rather than another good header. He rode his ponies to school. He would rather ride a horse than drive one, and in fact he never held a driver’s license or a bank account in his life. He got himself arrested for riding a horse down the interstate in Los Angeles. He did movie work for Disney as a boy, rode horses in it and swam with dolphins besides. His brother Ace wrote a song about the escapades, and by all accounts none of it is exaggerated. Goodrich, who loved him, puts it plainly: Liddon was rated R. He was also the kind of man who would hand you the shirt off his back and spend his last dollar on a friend. He lived it his way, and the people closest to him would not have traded a mile of it.

The 2026 Roping

Two years on, the roping his people built for him is finding its feet. Six pots ran at Riverside Rancheros on August 15. The Open and the Open Draw were four head for $100, enter up. The #11 Slide, the #10.5 and the #8.5 were three for $60, progressive after one, with a draw required in each. The Ladies Breakaway was three for $150 with $500 added, progressive after two, top twenty back to the short round and both calves caught to get there. Buckles went to the winner of every pot. Courtney Danylo won the breakaway average with a 12.04 on three head. Lillie Neffendorf and Branston Joseph won the #8.5. David Stark and Wyatt Lloyd won the #11 Slide with a 22.41 on three. Ethan Stassburger and Mike Fontes were 23.65 on three to win their average, and Stassburger placed in three separate divisions on the day. Blake VanStavern heeled his way into three checks. Brandon Bates was in the money three times as well.

Organizers are already building 2027, and they are looking for sponsors. Anyone who wants to put their name on a division, an award or the arena should contact Veronica Chavez.

Liddon Cowden Memorial Roping Results

Riverside Rancheros, 1198 Washington Street, Riverside, California. August 15, 2026. Second annual.

Ladies Breakaway. Average: First, Courtney Danylo, 12.04 on three, $1,190. Second, Shealynn Siataga, 13.84 on three, $890. Third, Shealynn Siataga, 18.88 on three, $590. Fourth, Kaylee Tate, 20.40 on three, $300. Rotation 1, Round 1: First, Reagan Hobson, 2.97, $150. Second, Shealynn Siataga, 3.47, $100. Rotation 1, Round 2: First, Kate Herrera, 3.36, $150. Second, Ashlynn Mangei, 3.77, $100. Overall round payoffs: First, Reagan Hobson, 2.97, $150. Second, Kate Herrera, 3.36, $100.

LCM #8.5. Average: First, Lillie Neffendorf and Branston Joseph, 26.61 on three, $1,220 each. Second, Taylor Hock and Tyler Chavez, 28.91 on three, $870 each. Third, Ethan Stassburger and Brett VanStavern, 30.62 on three, $660 each. Fourth, Shelley Lunde and Tristan Quigley, 34.30 on three, $485 each. Fifth, Cano Gonzales and Carlos Martinez, 36.64 on three, $245 each. Rotation 1, Round 1: First, Tyler Chavez and Brett VanStavern, 7.49, $230 each. Second, Ethan Stassburger and Brett VanStavern, 7.85, $155 each.

LCM #10.5. Average: First, Ethan Stassburger and Mike Fontes, 23.65 on three, $1,045 each. Second, Roger Coons and Cody Sill, 24.86 on three, $750 each. Third, Tyler Chavez and Brett VanStavern, 24.92 on three, $565 each. Fourth, Robert Perez and Levi Real, 26.10 on three, $420 each. Fifth, Jesus Oseguera and Adrian Cervantes, 26.28 on three, $210 each. Rotation 1, Round 1: First, Robert Perez and Levi Real, 6.07, $200 each. Second, Ethan Stassburger and Mike Fontes, 7.32, $130 each.

LCM #11 Slide. Average: First, David Stark and Wyatt Lloyd, 22.41 on three, $1,375 each. Second, Blake VanStavern and Branston Joseph, 22.68 on three, $870 each. Third, Clark Quigley and Mike Fontes, 25.00 on three, $685 each. Fourth, Abilene Chavez and Royce Brown, 26.12 on three, $435 each. Fifth, Julianna Perez and Levi Real, 27.61 on three, $255 each. Rotation 1, Round 1: First, Arturo Chavez and Brandon Bates, 5.37, $240 each. Second, Wyatt Lloyd and Tyler Ishman, 5.44, $160 each.

LCM Open Draw. Average: First, Cody Cowden and Blake VanStavern, 32.22 on four, $835 each. Second, Colt Cowden and Blake VanStavern, 32.60 on four, $555 each. Rotation 1, Round 1: First, Colt Cowden and Blake VanStavern, 5.94, $150 each.

LCM Open. Average: First, Cody Cowden and Will Cowden, 31.43 on four, $1,025 each. Second, Dillon Ishman and Tyler Ishman, 31.83 on four, $615 each. Third, Shain Sproul and Brandon Bates, 34.51 on four, $410 each. Rotation 1, Round 1: First, Danny Leslie and Brandon Bates, 5.78, $230 each.

Sponsorships for the 2027 Liddon Cowden Memorial Roping are open. Contact Veronica Chavez.