COLORADO SPRINGS, Colorado –-(Ammoland.com)- Junior Trap action was intense during last week’s USA Shooting National Championships and competitors get to do it all over again this week as the 2019 National Junior Olympic Shooting Championships (NJOSC) for Shotgun takes place Tuesday and Wednesday. USA Shooting’s month-long shotgun extravaganza rolls on at International Shooting Park in Colorado Springs with 186 trap shooters ready to compete.
Top competitors will include last week’s medalists from Nationals including Junior National Champions Heather Broski (Spring Hill, Tennessee) and Roe Reynolds (Quitman, Arkansas). Broski was the Junior Nationals bronze medalist in 2018 and moved up two spots on the podium Saturday. She finished NJOSC as the top athlete in her age class in 2018. Reynolds has been a steady trap performer at all levels including finishing as open runner-up at last year’s Nationals and finishing second among juniors at the Spring Selection Match.
Reigning Women’s NJOSC champion is 14-year-old Carey Garrison (Crossville, Tennessee) who proved she’s ready to defend her title by finishing second to Broski and then teaming with Reynolds to claim top honors in the open Mixed Team event. Garrison has been so successful in the event the past couple years, you sometimes forget that she’s still just 14. She was Junior National Champion at age 12 and was the youngest USA Shooting athlete ever to make a World Championship team when she competed in Changwon, South Korea in 2018. She began the year finishing second among juniors at the Spring Selection Match.
Other names to watch out for in the women’s field include Junior Nationals bronze medalist Jade Krolikowski (Dannebrog, Nebraska), Faith Pendergrass (Valley Springs, California), who finished as the top junior at Spring Selection, and Nicole Manhave (Longview, Texas), who finished third at Spring Selection and fourth at Junior Nationals Saturday.
Other names to keep an eye on for NJOSC contention in the men’s ranks will include Reynolds’ podium mates from Saturday in Matthew Wells (Beaver Dam, Wisconsin) and Grayson Davey (Anchorage, Alaska). Lance Thompson (Carlisle, Pennsylvania) and Steven Brown (Anchorage, Alaska) should also factor into the mix as well. Thompson was fourth Saturday while Brown finished fifth after winning the junior match at Spring Selection.
Competitors will shoot 75 targets Tuesday followed by 50 and the Finals on Tuesday.
About USA Shooting:
USA Shooting, a 501c3 non-profit corporation, was chartered by the United States Olympic Committee as the National Governing Body for the sport of shooting in April 1995. USA Shooting’s mission is to prepare American athletes to win Olympic medals, promote the shooting sports throughout the U.S. and govern the conduct of international shooting in the country. For more information, please visit us at usashooting.org.