New Year Honours: Mervyn Church

By ROSALEEN MACBRAYNE

Services to the sport of rodeo.

Champion cowboy Mervyn Church is a man of action, not words.

Being made an Order of Merit for services to the sport of rodeo leaves the 52-year-old bashful.

A sheep and cattle station manager at Rerewhakaaitu, between Rotorua and Murupara, Mr Church has been in the spotlight before, but it makes him uncomfortable.

Recognised by the Guinness Book of Records for being the only cowboy to win 15 national all-round championships back to back (apart from one in 1980, when he was beaten), his feats have been the subject of documentaries and articles in the past.

But he shies away from the television cameras.

"I don't like it. I can't talk on it [TV]," he said yesterday.

"I'm all right when I'm doing an event, but I don't know what to say [in interviews]."

Horseback is Mr Church's forte and he has 29 New Zealand rodeo awards - for bareback, saddle bronc, bullriding, calf roping and steerwrestling - to show for it, even if they are shoved away in drawers at home.

Regarded as this country's biggest influence on the sport, his portrait hangs in the Cowboy Hall of Fame in Colorado.

But the father of six and grandfather of 16 has never been out of New Zealand.

"I don't like travelling. It's bad enough going to the South Island [to compete]."

Despite that, Mr Church and his family attend rodeos from Invercargill to Kaitaia every year.

Last Saturday he had two placings in Gisborne and another at Opotiki on Sunday.

There will be no reining in this veteran cowboy for some time yet.

"I'll carry on till I can't climb in the saddle."

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