The New Zealand shearing team of John Kirkpatrick and Nathan Stratford have opened their 2012 UK tour with winning form at the Royal Highland Show, while Masterton's David Gordon shared the spotlight with them.
Kirkpatrick and Stratford beat the Scottish team of Hamish Mitchell and Callum Shaw in the first test of the tour. Four-time Golden Shears champion Kirkpatrick also won the final of the Royal Highland Open Championship with Mitchell second and Stratford third.
These were not the only successes for New Zealand shearers in front of the sizeable crowd at the show at Ingliston, Edinburgh.
Te Kuiti prodigy Jack Fagan added the Royal Highland Open senior title to a victory in the South of Scotland senior final at Dumfries a fortnight ago, and Golden Shears 50th anniversary novice champion Gordon was third in the intermediate final and led an invitation team to victory in a ground-breaking intermediate-class international against Scotland and Wales.
Kirkpatrick, of Napier, and Stratford, of Invercargill, claimed their places in the New Zealand team with wins in the New Zealand Open Championship and New Zealand Circuit finals respectively at Te Kuiti in April. Their next test is at the Lochearnhead Shears in Scotland this weekend.
