FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE March 23, 2005 Contact: Megan
Darnell (817) 244-6188 Ext. 125
The Wayne Hodges * Outlaw Conversions/NCHA Eastern National
Championships wrapped up in Jackson, MS
(Fort Worth, TX)—As the curtain dropped on the 2004 Wayne
Hodges * Outlaw Conversions/NCHA Eastern National Championship Finals, 11 new
riders were titled Champions.
Scratchin,
owned by EE Ranches, Whitesboro, TX and ridden by Guy Woods, Pilot Point, TX,
hit
pay dirt with the third cow in the Open Finals and came home a winner.
“We
started off with a couple of soft cows that weren’t exactly what I thought they
were going to be,” said Woods. “But the third cow was a really good one. We
held her for a long time. That’s what made the run.” Scratchin scored 220
points in the Finals.
Lindy
Merryman, 23, rode to the herd on Lil Smokin Dynamite, as the last rider in the
first bunch of the Non- Pro Finals, and came out a winner with 218 points. It
was the pair’s second title of the event. They won the $10,000 Novice/Non-Pro
championship with 220 points earlier in the week.
“I
should have stayed on my second cow a little longer,” said Merryman. “But I was
afraid to because of the way everybody else had gone out. The cows in that set
started out tough and were pretty much tough all the way through. I just lucked
out to get three that would stay out there. “We had watched my second cow all
along when they settled them and she ended up staying until the end. We had
some others picked out, but luckily, they were cut before me because they ran
over the two riders. I just got lucky that they cut them before I did.”
Lil
Smokin Dynamite, a five-year old mare sired by Dynamite Badger, was trained by
Merryman’s father, Tom Merryman. Lindy rode her last year primarily in limited
age events, where the mare won most of her $30,000 in career earnings.
Casberlena,
ridden by Austin Shepard of Summerdale, AL, scored 221 points to win the
$10,000 Novice Horse Championship.
Casberlena, a 7-year-old son of High Brow Cat owned by Treasa and Jim
Watson, Defuniak, FL.
“He’s a
little bit wild, but he has a lot of neat style,” said Shepard, who has been
riding the stallion for over a year. He placed in the 5/6-year-old open finals
of last year’s Music City Futurity and the Southern Futurity, and rode on
weekends just enough to qualify for the Eastern National Championships.
After a
disastrous run as the first draw in the first bunch of the $10,000 Novice
Finals, Sam Shepard, of Magnolia Spring, AL, had to grin and bear it when he
drew up as the first rider in the first bunch of the $3,000 Novice Finals,
aboard Cats Savannah. But this time first was a sweet spot.
“Last
night it was the kiss of death and tonight it was the lucky draw,” said
Shepard, who scored 220 for the $3,000 Novice win on 6-year-old Cats Savannah,
owned by Phil Adcock, Raymond, MS.
This was
just the second time Shepard had shown the High Brow Cat daughter. Joey Carroll
had qualified her for the Eastern National Finals and Shepard took over the
reins at the Memphis Futurity, where he qualified Cats Savannah for the finals
of the 5/6- Year-Old Classic.
“She’s
really a nice mare,” said Shepard. “We’re going to show her at the Super Stakes
and at aged events for the rest of the year.”
Adcock
and his family had shown pleasure horses for years, but Adcock was hooked on
cutting, when a friend invited him for a trial ride.
“I
was all smiles,” he remembered. “I always wanted to do something exciting and
at 51, it was such a rush to sit on a cutting horse. There’s just nothing like
it.”
$2,000 Limited Rider Division
Mandy
O’Hearn, Odessa, FL, lost her hat, but she held on to the title in the $2,000
Limited Rider Finals. Riding Mr Mom (DNA), a 13-year-old veteran with nearly
$200,000 in lifetime earnings, O’Hearn scored 217 points to defeat closest
rival, Christian Miller, by two and a-half points.
“I
love this old horse,” said O’Hearn, who scored 210 in the go-round to qualify
for the Finals. “I was a little worried at first about the cattle, but he got
right in there, held them and hung in there. He did a really good job for me.”
Mandy,
27, began riding cutting horses as a youth, but was completely out of the sport
for eight years while she attended nursing school and established a career.
Today, as a registered nurse, she juggles her night-shift schedule to be able
to cut.
“It’s
a little stressful trying to get time off and be able to get to the show and
still be awake,” she admitted. “But I love doing this.”
$10,000 Novice Horse/Non Pro Division
Lindy
Merryman, Abilene, TX, won the $10,000 Novice/Non-Pro championship aboard Lil
Smokin Dynamite. Merryman, who scored 215.5 in the go-round, marked 220 points
late in the first bunch of the Finals.
“She’s
definitely one of my favorites,” said Merryman, 23, who has been showing
cutting horses since she was five. “She’s easy to show and she’s just really
smart about a cow.”
Merryman purchased the 5-year-old Dynamite
Badger daughter as a 3-year-old, after her father, Tom Merryman trained the
mare for Woody Bartlett and his late wife Kelly. Last year, Merryman
concentrated on showing Lil Smokin Dynamite in limited age events and qualified
for the finals of several major events. Late in the year, she began showing on
weekends to qualify Lil Smokin Dynamite for the NCHA World Finals in Amarillo.
Priscilla
Crawley, 15, Unadilla, GA, scored 217.5 points to win the Junior Youth championship by one-half a point over Maison
Zuber, 13, Lufkin, Texas.
“I’m
really excited,” said Priscilla. “This
is the first time I’ve won this and this is my last year in the Junior Youth.”
Priscilla also won the go-round with 219 points. Her success was especially
gratifying because she was riding four year-old Cow Cattin, trained by her father,
Charles Crawley.
“My
old horse that I’d been showing got hurt about a month ago,” she explained.
“I’ve probably only shown (Cow Cattin) ten times. He’s so young, I didn’t know
what to expect. But once I got with him, we really clicked.”
Crawley
was presented a $1,000 from Boehringer Ingelheim Vetmedica.
Senior Youth Division
Jamie
Sokol bowed out of her final appearance as a Youth competitor in the Eastern
National Finals as a champion, with a 219-point win aboard Peppy Sandalena. It
was the second Eastern Senior Youth title for Sokol, a student at Daytona Beach
Community College. In 2002, she rode her sister Nikki’s horse, Lucky Bottom
Roy, to claim her first Senior Youth championship. She was Junior Youth Reserve
Champion on Lucky Bottom Roy in 1998.
“I
told my dad (trainer Ted Sokol) and (helper) Billy Kidd this morning,
that if I was doing good in my run, I was just going to chip and throw down on
the last cow,” said Sokol. “And I did it. It was a good way to go out.”
Sokol, who
also qualified to ride in the $20,000 Non-Pro division, was aboard Peppy
Sandalena, a horse previously owned by her family.
“The first
time I won here was special because it was the first time I’d ever won any big
event,” she said. “But this one is special because it’s my last year.”
Sokol
was also presented a $1,000 scholarship from Boehringer Ingelheim Vetmedica.
$20,000 Non Pro Division
Billy
Ballard, a dentist from Winchester, KY, scored 221 points riding Fox N Style to
beat second-placed Terry Tolar, on Southern Skeeto, by five points in the
$20,000 Non-Pro division. Both Ballard and Tolar qualified for the Finals on
the bubble with 206 points.
“This
is probably my best ride (ever),” said Ballard, who was champion of the $50,000
Amateur here last year on Fox N Style. “I was able to get control of the
cattle and when we got them out, they got right in my face and were really
tough. My horse just locked on the cattle and showed a tremendous amount of
courage to stay right there.”
Ballard, who has been cutting for three years, began riding
when his son Josh competed in roping events.
Ballard also took home the deluxe three-horse slant load trailer
compliments of Wayne Hodges Trailer Sales.
He will have one-year use of the trailer for marking the highest score
at the show. He won the random drawing
among the three top scores.
$50,000 Amateur Division
Troy
Goodwin, Wylie, TX, scored 218
points for the win in the $50,000 Amateur. Goodwin, who rode the Paint horse
Smart Card, was diagnosed with pneumonia two days before the Finals, but was
determined to ride. He also placed fifth in the $10,000 Amateur on Thursday.
“Two
years ago they put me in the hospital in Houston for double pneumonia, after I
made the Finals down there. They wouldn’t let me out of the hospital to ride,
so there was no way I was going home this week.”
Missy Jean Rosenberg,
Covington, LA, left her mount, Chloes My Aunt in his stall to recover from a
stone bruise and rode her husband Jerry’s horse Pepto Jack to win the $10,000
Amateur with 219 points. It was Rosenberg’s first time to show the stallion.
“Thankfully I had a backup,” said Rosenberg,
who was reserve champion here last year, on Chloes My Aunt, in the $2,000 Limit
Rider and placed fourth in the $10,000 Amateur. “He’s probably a little more
fancy than my horse. He felt really nice today.”
Evan Sutton, 15, Garland, TX, captured the
reserve championship with 215 on Ginnin Shorty. “I knew it was going to be
close,” said Sutton, who was reserve champion here last year in the Junior
Youth.
NCHA is honored to have the support of Wayne
Hodges Trailer Sales and Outlaw Conversions as title sponsors for the
event. Also proud award sponsors were
Murray Leather Goods, Teskey’s Saddle Shop, Gist Silversmiths, KO Trading
Company, and Boehringer Ingelheim Vetmedica.
The sport of cutting has roots in Western ranching
traditions, where good horses were a necessity for everyday ranch work and
cattle handling. The National Cutting Horse Association was formed in 1946 by a
group of cowboys and ranchers, who wanted to promote cutting competition,
standardize rules and preserve the cutting horses' Western heritage. Today, the
Fort Worth-based NCHA represents over 16,000 people and oversees more than
2,200 NCHA-approved shows with more than $35 million in total prize money
awarded annually. For more information about the NCHA or the sport of cutting,
please call 817-244-6188 or visit www.nchacutting.com.
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