a joking matter when the two put aside their cowboy hats and pulled out their Xbox 360 controllers.
It wasn’t uncommon for a controller or two to be thrown across the room as Jess would be taking Kobe Bryant to the hole and slamming a dunk down viciously against Jake in a game of NBA 2K10.
“We didn’t play a whole lot of games, but I guess in junior high we got an Xbox,” Jess said with a smile. “I would always beat him with the Lakers and Kobe Bryant. He would get so pissed. He broke an Xbox once.”
Sometimes fists were needed.
“We would get into literal fistfights,” Jess added, now laughing. “If he beat me in a video game or roping the dummy. Just little dumb things.”
Jake would sometimes be the one showing his older brother who is boss on the roping dummy or in a different game.
The two were always, always trying to defeat the other in whatever they were doing.
It was a true sibling rivalry.
“Yeah, we were always trying to one-up each other,” Jake said. “We have that winner’s mentality. I am sure there were controllers thrown.”
The two have become less confrontational in the last few years, and the two siblings are rooting for each other inside the bull riding arena nowadays.
Jess has gone on to become the youngest World Champion in PBR history last year with his brother in attendance, while Jake is hoping to follow in his brother’s footsteps after making his professional non-premier series debut in March at the Calgary PBR Canada Monster Energy Tour event.
“We are really close now,” Jess said. “Heck, we are best friends. We push each other every single time and better each other.”
Jake, 18, is next slated to ride on Thursday night at the Brighton, Colorado, Touring Pro Division event.
He has begun his career 5-for-24 and is competing in his first event since injuring his neck in Salinas, California.
The younger Lockwood explained in Bismarck, North Dakota, that there is some additional pressure on his shoulders seeing as he is the younger brother of the reigning World Champion.
“There is more pressure than some of the other up-and-coming kids have, but it is no different I would say,” Jake said. “Yeah, you feel a little bit of pressure, but if you don’t ride your bull there is nothing else you can do about it.”
And, of course, Jake can take a lesson out of his video game playbook.
“Let it motivate you,” he added. “Try to do what he did and do it better. I dang sure want to try and do what he did, and do it better if I can.”
Jake is a bull rider first and foremost, but he was quite the talented high school athlete at Powder River County High School.
He was named the school’s six-man football team’s offensive player of the year this fall, and he also wrestled, played basketball and was a fourth-place finisher last year in the 200-meter at the Class C state track and field meet.
Jake also followed in his brother’s footsteps by winning the 2017 Montana State Bull Riding high school championship after Jess’s run of three consecutive titles.
Jess, who won’t ride again until the 25th PBR: Unleash The Beast resumes on Aug. 11 in Tulsa, Oklahoma, is rooting for his brother to succeed, and he understands that some may put unfair expectations on his brother.
“It will take some time to adjust,” Jess said. “It does for anyone. It did for me greatly. But I think once he gets going, and kind of sees how everything is, he will adjust. He is adjusting to getting on better bulls every weekend.”
Jess at first didn’t want his brother to make a full-time commitment to the PBR like he did.
He had hoped Jake would compete in some local amateur bull ridings in Montana and make the switch to the PBR this summer.
Jess was a little more seasoned on veteran bulls compared to Jake, but Jake is physically more mature than Jess was when he was 18.
Jake is listed at 5-foot-9 inches, whereas Jess checks in at roughly four inches shorter (5-foot-5).
However, since Jake made the switch, Jess has been happy with his brother’s determination to try and get better each week.
Jake is still only a senior in high school.
“I wanted him to come to the PBR and dominate,” Jess said. “I told him I thought he should stay at the amateurs until the summer starts. He got mad at me and wouldn’t listen.”
They may butt heads every now and then like most siblings, but Jake has appreciated the advice Jess has passed down to him since he turned pro.
Jake knows the lessons Jess learned from PBR Director of Livestock Cody Lambert are ones he can benefit from as well.
“Him being around Cody and what not, and being on this tour, he knows a lot more than I want to give him credit for,” Jake said. “He does help me out for sure.”
So if he could live in a world where he wasn’t known as Jess Lockwood’s little brother, how would he explain himself to fans?
“Just a bull rider doing what he can I guess,” Jake concluded. “Trying to ride his bulls.”
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