American Idol winner Laine Hardy is coming to the NCHA Youth Week.
The Season 17 champion of the television reality series will perform at the historic Fort Worth venue during the National Cutting Horse Association (NCHA) Metallic Cat Summer Spectacular.
NCHA Youth Week, which features many events for young cutters, kicked off Tuesday with the first round of the Scholarship Cutting and National Youth Cutting Horse Association (NYCHA) World Finals.
Hardy will perform at 8:30 p.m., Friday (July 26). That’s the night of the last round of the Holy Cow Performance Horses NYCHA World Finals. Click here for tickets.
This year’s Youth Week festivities are sponsored by the NCHA Charities Foundation. The NYCHA World Finals is sponsored by Holy Cow Performance Horses.
NCHA Charities Foundation Executive Director Laura Wood said the non-profit group sponsored this year’s Youth Week festivities so the association’s youth could focus on programming and activities.
Given that NCHA supports the the show-related activities, Wood said the Foundation focused on enhancing the youth experience and out-of-competition activities. A number of NCHA members also gave the Foundation money to put toward Youth Week, she said.
“While historically the youth themselves have had to raise all that extra money [for Youth week activities], we decided that it was time for us to step up and take that on,” Wood said.
New Youth Week activities include a recreation space next to the Best of The West trade show vendors. The area has room for basketball, dodgeball, corn hole and other activities. There also was a bounce house for youngsters, and plans call for Rodeo Zone to offer additional activities there on Saturday.
Other activities for the NCHA Youth Week include a family fun night at Top Golf in Fort Worth, a painting party, draw party, speaking contest, dance and DJ.
Click here for the full Youth Week schedule at nchacutting.com.
In addition to all the fun activities and world championship cutting, Youth Week also serves as an annual convention for cutting’s youngest members. There’s a general youth meeting, plans for an update on the future of cutting youth programs, youth officer elections, leadership events, speakers and a Hall of Fame banquet.
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