With a plan to lasso some beefy marketing heft for tire retailers, the Cooper invitational roundup featuring the Professional Bull Riders (PBR) series rides into Columbus, Ohio this weekend.

The Oct. 10-11 Nationwide Arena event will be nationally telecast on the cable Versus network beginning Saturday at 8 p.m. Eastern time; the conclusion airs Sunday starting at 9 p.m.

It is being heavily promoted as the “Cooper Tire Invitational” on all printed and online materials, including social networking sites. The company name will also be pitched in advertisements, programs, handouts and onsite public address announcements. A Cooper-branded barrel, plus an array of banners, will be highly visible during most of the televised action shots.

Cooper has been a major PBR sponsor since 2008. In its 17 years, the series has taken the sport from a mere allotted time slot during traditional rodeos to a stand-alone event with network coverage on NBC, Fox and Versus, including its own reality show, according to Chris Pantani, director of motorsports and event marketing for the Findlay, Ohio-based tire maker.

He adds that the series encompasses more than 450 hours of annual prime time TV programming, herding in some 100 million viewers.

The PBR has more than 1,200 bull riders competing in 300-plus sanctioned competitions in the United States, Australia, Brazil, Canada and Mexico. It currently stages four domestic tours.

“We’re proud to be the Official Tire of the PBR,” Pantani says. “We’ve built a great relationship with the PBR, and we’re happy to show our support, in our home state, for one of the fastest growing sports in North America.”

Cooper had begun its presence by sponsoring a team of professional bull riders, including Wiley Petersen, Zack Brown (the 2008 Cooper Tire Invitational champion) and Skeeter Kingsolver.

This weekend in Columbus, these same three cowboys will join 37 others in competition, with the first two rounds featuring the riders being randomly matched against the PBR’s toughest bulls. Those posting the top 15 combined scores will advance to a championship round on Sunday. The competitor with the highest combined point total score on three bulls will be declared the winner.

For more information, visit www.coopertire.com or www.pbrnow.com.