National Sporting Clays Cup Fundraiser for USA Shooting

[USA Shooting]

2020 Vision Comes Into Focus during National Sporting Clays Cup Fundraiser at Houston’s American Shooting Centers
HOUSTON (May 15, 2018)
America’s shooting team is embarking on complete 2020 vision and the realization of such will get underway this week at Houston’s American Shooting Centers, site of USA Shooting’s National Sporting Clays Cup Fundraiser.

The 2020 Olympic Games get underway in a little more than 800 days and events like the National Sporting Clay Cup help bring together a group of people to help support the Olympic shooting sports and to give America’s shooting team the boost it needs to find success in Tokyo.

More than 70 teams are expected to participate in Saturday’s National Sporting Clay Cup. USA Shooting has raised a combined $350,000 previously during their prior two events in 2014 and 2016. Plenty of competition and interaction with USA Shooting Team members will accompany the event that includes a private benefactor dinner and practice session, along with Saturday’s main event.

The third reiteration of the National Sporting Clay Cup Fundraiser will once again feature Houston’s own hometown Olympic gold medalist and five-time Olympian Glenn Eller. His father, Butch, operates American Shooting Centers (ASC) on the city’s west side. The fact that ASC is able to host this event let alone cater to the shooting sports needs of Space City residents is a testament to the staff involved after two epic flooding events since 2015, including devastation caused by Hurricane Harvey nine months ago.

Still competing after making his international debut 19 years ago, Eller has new motivation and challenge ahead of his attempt to make a sixth Olympic Team. His shotgun event of Double Trap was eliminated from the Olympic program after 2016 and he’s trying to reinvent himself in the discipline of Trap, which hasn’t seen an American qualify to compete in the last two previous Olympic Games.

As the first American male in the Shotgun discipline to make five Olympic Teams, Eller is trying to change all that. He earned a bronze medal in his new event specialty last year at the USA Shooting National Championships and just recently finished first in selection to compete in his 13th World Championship later this summer in Changwon, South Korea.

Eller’s teammates will also participate including two-time Olympic gold medalist Vincent Hancock (Eatonton, Georgia), 2016 Paralympic pistol shooter Marco DeLaRosa (San Antonio, Texas), national champions Ashley Carroll (Solvang, California), Derek Haldeman (Sunbury, Ohio) and Amber English (Colorado Springs, Colorado) and up-and-coming pistol shooter Mason Talbert (College Station, Texas).

Starting in Texas’ biggest city, USA Shooting is slated to host three major fundraising events this year with Fundraisers also destined for the Childress Vineyard in Lexington, North Carolina (August 30) as well as the Oak Tree Gun Club in Newhall, California, October 13-14.

With Tokyo in Sight, USA Shooting’s fundraising events concept will lure shooting sport enthusiasts to support the USA Shooting Team as they head toward the 2018 World Championships and the upcoming 2020 Olympic and Paralympic Games in Tokyo, Japan. As the only non-government supported shooting team in the world, USA Shooting relies heavily on donors and sponsors to help maintain a history of success that includes 110 Olympic medals.

The tenets that have built the shooting sports into what it is today evoke passion, advocacy, nationalistic pride and tradition. There is no greater representative of those values for the shooting sports than the members of America’s Shooting Team. The USA Shooting Team carries on the proud tradition of medal-winning success and shooting skill unlike any other country in the world, exemplifying the greatest defense possible for protecting, preserving and promoting the shooting sports legacy of this country.

“These events will introduce our team and sport to a whole new audience and fanbase across the nation,” said Patsy Woods, Senior Business Development Manager for USA Shooting. “We have athletes in need and thus we’re partnering with some of the industry’s most recognizable brands and incorporating top gun ranges and exclusive wineries to create exciting donor events that helps promote our 2020 vision and the great athletes that make us who we are.”