Junior trapshooters represent state in tourney

Nevada team to compete in nationals

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Scores of young trapshooters from Southern Nevada participated in the Scholastic Clay Target Program (SCTP) Nevada Trapshooting Championships, held June 11 at the Spring Creek Trap and Skeet Club in Elko with many competitors earning the chance to compete for Nevada at the SCTP National Championships in Ohio next week.

A team representing Southern Nevada's Silver State Junior Clay Breakers placed first in the junior experienced division, scoring 814 points and defeating another Silver State Junior Clay Breakers team from the area, which finished second with 736 points. The Las Vegas team of Christian Mayfield, Dylan Mitchel, Colton Price, Dean Pinkham and Loralee Price won the state title, with another local team of Ian Schaeffer, rookie Zachary Taylor, Mark Stipanov, Alex Cromwick and Sam Mayo finishing second.

The winning junior experienced team -- with Schaeffer replacing Mitchel as an alternate -- will be one of two groups from the Silver State Clay Breakers traveling to the Grand American World Trapshooting Championships, which begin Tuesday in Vandalia, Ohio. The second group making the trip is the state's third-place finishers in the senior novice division, which scored 800 points. That team features John Buckley, Dimitrios Kenourgios, Brittany Spurling, Shelby Walker and Cory Schenker, all of Las Vegas.

Because Buckley could not attend the nationals, Linda Hand, the state director for the scholastic group, plugged in Brennan Mayfield as the alternate.

The fifth place team, scoring 785 points in the senior novice division, is comprised of Patrick O'Brien of Henderson, Cory Lagor, Cody Lagor and Levi Derosier of Las Vegas and K.C. Edgel of North Las Vegas.

Also qualifying for the nationals in the senior experienced division with a fifth-place finish and 793 points at state, but unable to attend, was the Silver State Clay Breakers team of Mayfield, Mitchel McGuire, Natalie Hornbeck and Weston Shoemaker of Las Vegas and Kody Edgel of North Las Vegas.

In the junior novice division, another team representing the group -- Logan Derosier, rookie Michael Reese, Terry Willis and Joey Hornbeck, all of Las Vegas, and Cody Kruse of Logandale -- qualified for nationals by finishing fourth with 756 points in their division. The group will not travel to Ohio.

Hand, who along with her husband, Tom, formed the Nevada SCTP in 2002, was happy with the performance of the Southern Nevadans at the state meet.

"They did very well this year," Hand said of the local participants who used 12-gauge shotguns in the competition. "And I think our junior experienced team probably has the best chance (at performing well at the nationals) this year."

Last year, a different local group representing the junior experienced division performed well nationals with a 14th place finish.

Hand, an inductee into the Nevada State Trapshooting Hall of Fame last year, said all that qualify can't necessarily make the trip to nationals, which had over 200 teams with 1,100 youths from 31 states compete last summer.

"There were too many people out of all the other teams (that qualified) that just couldn't afford to go," she said. "They pretty much have to pay their own way and it's around $650 per child to go back there. If all the kids had the money to go, we'd take them all. And we can't afford to fund it all at $600 to $700 per kid."

Teams that qualified but have more than one member unable to attend nationals cannot compete as the SCTP rules permit only one alternate per group.

Hand said trapshooting is still a growing sport in Southern Nevada.

"I think the thing that's really happening is that the kids are having a good time so they're telling their friends and their friends are telling their parents and they're coming out to take a look at what we do and they see that we are organized," she said.

Hand knows a little about trapshooting. At the state meet she won "just about everything she entered," capturing her seventh Nevada State Ladies Singles Championship, her sixth Nevada State Ladies Doubles Championship and the Western Zone Ladies Doubles title.

The SCTP was developed by the national Shooting Sports Foundation and offers young men and women the chance to compete as a team in trap, skeet and sporting clays for state and national championships as well as scholarship money. The program is designed to instill in participants safe firearms handling, commitment, responsibility, leadership and teamwork. Nearly 40 states and 5,000 youths take part in SCTP.

Anyone seeking more information about trapshooting in Southern Nevada can call the Las Vegas Gun Club at 645-5606, Hand at 565-1047, or log on to the Silver State Clay Breakers Web site at www.silverstate-claybreakers.com.