With lights and form blazing, Angela Stevens wins the New Zealand Shears Open woolhandling title. Photo / Doug Laing
With lights and form blazing, Angela Stevens wins the New Zealand Shears Open woolhandling title. Photo / Doug Laing
The New Zealand Shears in Te Kūiti again proved to be a happy hunting ground for Hawke’s Bay’s best.
By the time the three-day shearing and woolhandling championships ended on Saturday, three of the titles had gone to Hawke’s Bay competitors.
They were headed by Angela Stevens’ win in the Open woolhandling final, re-establishing a Hawke’s Bay link to the title, which had been dominated for much of the last two decades by world champions Shree Alabaster and Joel Henare, each missing from the championships this year, opening the door to some of those who’d competed so regularly throughout the country over the years with only the briefest touches of the winning ribbon.
The other major Hawke’s Bay wins went to Maraekakaho shearer, farmer and rural contractor Rowland Smith in the North Island Shearer of the Year final, although he was beaten in the New Zealand Shears Circuit and New Zealand Shears Open finals, and Stevens’ cousin and Wairoa shearer Bruce Grace, winner of the Intermediate shearing final, who was also named Shearing Sports New Zealand’s number-one-ranked Intermediate shearer for the year.
Stevens’ father, three-time New Zealand Shears Open shearing champion, four-time Golden Shears Open champion and 2017 world champion John Kirkpatrick, won the Open Plate, an event for the six 2023 Open semifinalists who did not make the top six for the final.
While South Island shearer Leon Samuels’ win in that Open final was only the second by a non-Hawke’s Bay shearer since 2007, Stevens’ win in the Open woolhandling was the first linked to Hawke’s Bay since Te Kūiti-based Hanatia Tipene, from Porangahau, won in 2013. Other previous winners from Hawke’s Bay were Susan Puhipuhi (Biddle) from Norsewood in the first three years of woolhandling competitions at the Te Kūiti event (1988 - 1990), and Huia Clarke (Puna) in 2007.
The late Ronnie Goss, originally from the Wairoa area but based in the Kimbolton area throughout her competition career, won in 1999 and 2003.
The 31-year-old Stevens, competing while expecting a fourth child in late June, had a successful lower-grades career, winning the New Zealand Shears Junior final in 2017, a win followed a year later by husband and shearer Ricci Stevens.
She’d had just two Open wins - the second, at Āpiti in 2021, being a prelude to a fifth-place finish at the New Zealand Shears two months later.
She represented New Zealand in two transtasman tests, last November and last month, but with most events cancelled last summer, she had competed in just two other finals, at Levin in January last year and Taihape in January this year.
The win by Grace in the Intermediate shearing was his ninth win of the season, having first succeeded at Stratford in November, followed by victories at Wairoa, Levin, Dannevirke, Marton, Āria, Raetihi and Waitomo, although she missed a place in the Golden Shears final six as she placed seventh in the semifinals.
Samuels’ win in the Open final was the first by a South Island shearer in a Golden Shears or New Zealand Shears Open final in 30 years, and enabled him to join Smith in the New Zealand team for the world championships in Scotland in June.
Bruce Grace, from Wairoa, wins the New Zealand Shears Intermediate shearing title, and claims the number-one ranking nationwide for the season in his grade. Photo / Doug Laing
Samuels was first finished in Saturday night’s Open final, his 15 minute, 6.05 second time being one of the fastest in a final of 20 adult sheep in New Zealand, and claimed the title by 1.274 points from Northland speedster Toa Henderson, who finished second-off-the-board with 15:12:53 in his first New Zealand Shears, or Golden Shears, Open final.
Smith was third to finish, taking 15:31:53, but uncharacteristically incurred the most penalties on the shearing board.
There was also a Hawke’s Bay link to the third Open shearing title decided in Te Kūiti, with New Zealand Shears Circuit honours going to Masterton shearer and contractor Paerata Abraham, formerly of Dannevirke.
The crews of contractors John and Raylene Kirkpatrick had further success on top of the wins by daughter Angela and nephew Grace, with Sam Fletcher, from Mount Maunganui, and Kaivah Cooper, of Napier, finishing second and third in the Novice final won on Friday by Trent Alabaster, of Taihape.
From the fringes of Hawke’s Bay, Papatwawa mum of five months Laura Bradley, 25, a Senior shearer with a history of Junior and Intermediate successes, won the Women’s shearing final on Friday by just 0.105 points from Open-class shearer and former Golden Shears lower-grades shearing and woolhandling champion Sarah Hewson, of Blenheim, who was first to finish and shore the six sheep in 8:28:61.
It was a major championship for the female shearers, among whom was Emma Martin, of Gore, who won the Junior shearing final on Friday, and on Saturday spearheaded an all-female Canterbury-Marlborough Development Circuit team to a comfortable win over three male counterparts from the King Country.
The 27-year-old Martin had on Friday become only the third female to win a New Zealand Shears shearing title, and the first in 13 years since Sarah Goss’s win in 2010, before she embarked on the rugby career that led to an Olympic Games gold medal in sevens and the winning of the Women’s Rugby World Cup last year, under the married name of Sarah Hirini.
In another feature of the Shears, Smith and Samuels completed a 3-0 Wools of New Zealand Shearing Series win over the Wales Development team of Gethin Lewis, who shears in Hawke’s Bay for contractor Brendon Mahony, and Dylan Jones.
Results from the New Zealand Shears Shearing and Woolhandling Championships at Te Kūiti, March 30 - April 1, 2023:
Shearing:
Wools of New Zealand Series (20 sheep): New Zealand (Rowland Smith 16min 6.41sec, 57.171pts, 1; Leon Samuels 15min 39.77sec, 57.239pts) 114.41pts beat Wales Development Gethin Lewis 15min 40.65sec, 61.283pts; Dylan Jones 16min 20.47sec, 67.474pts) 128.757pts. New Zealand won the series 3-0.
New Zealand Shears Circuit final (five merinos, five second-shear, five lambs): Paerata Abraham (Masterton) 15min 34.72sec, 61.469pts, 1; Hemi Braddick (Eketāhuna) 16min 6.41sec, 61.588pts, 2; Nathan Stratford (Invercargill) 16min 50.18sec, 61.709pts, 3; Leon Samuels (Invercargill) 15min 24.17sec, 62.009pts, 4; Rowland Smith (Maraekakaho) 16min 34.53sec, 63.193pts, 5; Digger Balme (Ōtorohanga) 15min 26.48sec, 66.591pts, 6.
New Zealand Shears Junior final (five sheep): Emma Martin (Gore) 8min 3.39sec, 30.37pts, 1; Coby Lambert (Raupunga) 7min 29.78sec, 33.289pts, 2; Cody Waihape (Gore) 9min 0.46sec, 35.023pts, 3; Daniel Rogers (Raetihi) 8min 58.21sec, 35.311pts, 4; Ryka Swann (Wairoa) 8min 20.31sec, 37.016pts, 5; Sam Parker (Raglan) 8min 2.52sec, 37.126pts, 6.
NewZealand Shears Novice final (two sheep): Trent Alabaster (Taihape) 6min 17.22aec, 28.861pts, 2; Sam Fletcher (Mount Maunganui) 5min 27.57sec, 29.379pts, 2; Kaivah Cooper (Napier) 6 min 10.96sec, 30.548pts, 3; Malcolm Nahona (Kaiwaka) 8min 4.22sec, 34.711pts, 4; George Peacock (Dannevirke) 7min 4.13sec, 37.207pts, 5; Rebecca Dickson (Feilding) 8min 36.9sec, 41.845pts, 6.
New Zealand Shears Women’s final (six sheep): Laura Bradley (Papatawa) 8min 39.86sec, 32.993pts, 1; Sarah Hewson (Blenheim) 8min 28.61sec, 33.098pts, 2; Emma Marton (Gore) 10min 34.05sec, 38.703pts, 3; Lydia Thomson (Rangiora) 11min 21.18sec, 44.226pts, 4; Cushla Abraham (Masterton) 10min 50,97sec, 44.549pts, 5; Peggysue Tohengaroa (Āria) 10min 34.44sec, 46.389pts, 6.
Whaanu Teams Relay (five sheep): Sir David and Jack Fagan 4min 34.56sec, 23.528sec, 1; Nuki and Joseph Gordon (Masterton) 5min 43.77sec, 26.389pts, 2; Mark and Cory Barrowcliffe 5min 28.23sec, 27.712pts, 3; Digger and Josh Balme 5min 38.23sec, 28.112pts, 4; David and Michael Buick 5min 58.82sec, 28.941pts, 5; Nail and Sean Fagan 5min 38.89sec, 31.545pts, 6.
Development Teams Challenge (2 sheep): Canterbury Marlborough Development (Emma Martin 2min 51.03sec, 12.552pts; Lydia Thomson 3min 45.41sec, 18.771pts; Robin Krause 4min 34.84sec, 21.742pts) 53.03pts, beat New Zealand Shears King Country (Coby Lambert 2min 38.67sec, 23.434pts; Cody Lambert 4min 31.55sec, 23.578pts; Devon Ball 5min 32.13sec, 26.607pts) 73.619pts.
New Zealand Shears Junior final: Tre Ratana Sciascia (Taihape) 73.744pts, 1; Te Whetu Brown (Wairoa) 81.38pts, 2; Makayla Neil (Taumarunui) 90.144pts, 3; Chloe Henderson (Feilding) 112.5pts, 4; Kelly Barrett-Thom (Kawhia) 118.25pts, 5.
Shearing and woolhandling:
Inter-island shearing and woolhandling (six second-shear sheep): North Island (shearers Rowland Smith, Toa Henderson, Gavin Mutch; woolhandlers Sue Turner, Hanatia Tipene, Angela Stevens) 308.299pts beat South Island (shearers Leon Samuels, Nathan Stratford, Casey Bailey; woolhandlers Tamara Marshall, Chelsea Colier, Monica Potae) 333.429pts.
