The National Cutting Horse Association’s Champions’ Cup brought together great horses and great riders, and offered a slice of history.
A sellout crowd meant standing room only at the National Cutting Horse Association‘s Champions’ Cup, held during the 2011 NCHA Futurity in December in Fort Worth, Texas. But much of the time it was hard to tell the difference between those with seats and those without, as fans leapt to their feet more than once to offer a standing ovation to some of the sport’s legends, young and old.
The Champions’ Cup brought together past Futurity-winning riders and horses, and was part of the event’s 50th anniversary celebration. Sometimes it also wasn’t clear who was enjoying it most — the crowd or those past champions who had the opportunity to be part of it all.
From Buster Welch, who won the first NCHA Futurity in 1962 on Money’s Glo, to the 2010 winning rider, Lloyd Cox, the entrants spanned generations and styles of riding and training. It was the first time many in the crowd had seen Welch ride; the Rotan, Texas, rancher hadn’t shown in about 20 years. But at 83, he rides and works cattle every day, and hasn’t lost his sense or balance or timing.
Welch rode Bet Hesa Cat, the stallion Alabama trainer Austin Shepard piloted to the open world championship for 2011.
“[Austin] really trained that horse well, and he’s a true cow horse,” Welch says of Bet Hesa Cat, a 5-year-old son of High Brow Cat and out of NCHA world champion mare Bet Yer Blue Boons. “Lindy Burch [who showed Bet Yer Blue Boons] approached me about riding him, and I accepted right off. With good help like I had and a good horse, showing was easy.”
Welch won the last of his five NCHA Futurity titles on Peppy San Badger in 1977, and says he thought about that great stallion as he walked to the herd.
“Before I went down, I just tried to concentrate on what I was trying to do, and show like I was on ‘Little Peppy’,” he says.
The Champions’ Cup was full of memorable moments, including Welch’s 221-point run. The competition was divided into three age divisions. Shepard, 34, won the first with his electrifying 230-point ride on High Brow CD, the stallion he rode to the 2007 NCHA Futurity championship. Jody Galyean, who rode Royal Silver King to the 1986 title, showed Auspicious Cat to a score of 230 and earned the championship in his age category.
It was a historic night for the Galyean family, as Jody’s two sons, Wesley and Beau, also have won the Futurity and competed in the Champions’ Cup. They helped the Marietta, Oklahoma, trainer in the arena, along with his daughter, Christina, and his father, Kenneth.
Dennis Funderburch, 77, a longtime trainer and showman from Del Rio, Texas, rode Peppys Short Nino to a 223 and the senior championship. And one of the evening’s highlights was Spencer Harden’s ride on Reytheon. Battling Parkinson’s disease at age 82, he waved his hat to the crowd in celebration following his ride. Now living in Weatherford, Texas, Harden not only won the NCHA Futurity open division in 1989 aboard July Jazz, but earned the non-pro title in 1982 on that horse’s dam, Jazabell Quixote.
Shepard, who was elated to bring back his Futurity-winning mount from the stallion’s retirement to stud, says the Champions’ Cup was a once-in-a-lifetime event that was a privilege for riders and spectators.
“I always thought that I would rank winning the Futurity as my favorite moment in cutting, but it was winning the Champions’ Cup and getting to show in the same event as guys like Buster Welch, Dennis Funderburgh and Spencer Harden,” Shepard says. “I never thought that anything would overshadow the open finals of the Futurity, but the Champions’ Cup did.”
This article was originally published in the February 2012 issue of Western Horseman.
