Saturday belonged to the Youth at the NCHA 6666 Eastern Nationals in Jackson, Miss. Competition was keen from the go-rounds, beginning in the morning, through the Senior and Junior Youth Finals later in the day.

Pittman Turner, 17, from Franklin, Ga., won the Senior Youth championship with 222 points on Hickorys Handy Cat, while Ryan Rapp, 15, Weatherford, Tex., was reserve champion with 219 points aboard Im Reydioactive. Lance Cooper, who scored 221 point to win the Senior Youth go-round, and Skylar Kidd tied for third with 215 points on Im Stuck On You and Pretty Uptown, respectively.

Pittman Turner, last year’s Junior Youth reserve champion on Hickorys Handy Cat, is an eight-times NCHA Eastern Nationals finalist. He won his first buckle in the 2012 Junior Youth aboard Hez Neon Blue. In 2013, he was a Junior Youth finalist with A Cat Named Sue and a $2,000 Limited finalist riding Heza Smart Doc.

In 2014, riding Hez Neon Blue, he claimed reserve in the $15,000 Amateur Finals, and was a Junior Youth finalist on Hickorys Handy Cat, who he also showed as a Junior Youth finalist in 2015. It was Hez Neon Blue, however, who carried him as a finalist in the 2015 $15,000 Amateur Finals.

Hickorys Handy Cat, by High Brow Cat, is an NCHA Eastern Nationals veteran. The 10-year-old gelded son of  High Brow Cat was a three-times Open finalist with Zeke Entz; won the 2013 $2,000 Limited Rider championship with Bobbie Hughes; and carried Zeke Entz and his daughter Katlyn in five other finals divisions between 2012 and 2014.

Ryan Rapp came to Jackson off of a reserve championship performance on Tuff Julie LTE $65,720 in the 2017 Bonanza Cutting 5/6. In 2016, Ryan won the NCHA Derby Non-Pro Limited and the Cotton Stakes Non-Pro Limited on the Woody Be Tuff daughter, who he has shown to place in 10 major events, as well as in the 2015 NCHA Futurity Non-Pro Semi-Finals.

Seven-year-old Im Reydioactive LTE $110,201, by Dual Rey, Ryan’s Eastern Nationals mount, also recently carried Ryan’s mother, NCHA Non-Pro Hall of Fame rider Mary Ann Rapp, to win the Mercuria NCHA World Series at Augusta.  In 2014, when owned and shown by Kristen Galyean, Im Reydioactive won both the NCHA Derby and the NCHA Super Stakes Non-Pro Gelding championships.

Junior Youth Finalists

Charles Russell Bushaw, Weatherford, Tex., scored 222 points to win the NCHA 6666 Eastern Nationals Junior Youth championship. Lily Erwin, Cleveland, Ga., earned the reserve championship with 216.5 points.  Josceylyn Pilcher, Lovington, Ill., placed third with 216 points, and Charles Russell Bushaw’s younger brother, Will James, tied Maggie Malee Wilson, Cordova, Ala., for fourth with 213 points. Interestingly, fifth-placed Ryann Packard, Sun City, Kan., and Maggie Wilson were both riding horses out of the Lenas Jewel Bars’ daughter Pretty Jewels.

Rounding out the Junior Youth finalist field were Millie Joe Rosenberg, Bush, La., Blake Heid, Bryan, Tex., Faith Farris, Houston, Tex., and Karrigan Cagley, Livingston, La.

This was Charles Russell Bushaw’s first NCHA Eastern Nationals finals, but in 2016 he placed third in the Non-Pro Cutting $15,000 Amateur division on Peptotoodie LTE $150,491, and also showed the Peptotime daughter as a Junior Youth finalist in the NYCHA World Finals and the NYCHA Scholarship Cutting. In addition, 12-year-old Charles Russell was a 2016 NCHA Futurity Non-Pro Semi finalist and Non-Pro Limited finalist riding Bellas Cat.

Reserve champion Lily Erwin rode Playful Highbrow CD, a gelding that Walt Erwin rode to win lat year’s Open championship at the NCHA Eastern Nationals.

Walt also rode the 7-year-old son of High Brow CD to win the Limited Open last year at the Non-Pro Cutting.