Shearing: Megan Whitehead and Hannah McColl smash two world records

Shearers Megan Whitehead (left) and Hannah McColl after their world record was confirmed in the Grant Brow woolshed near Gore. Photo / Charly

Cousins Megan Whitehead and Hannah McColl got shearing sports’ biggest season of tally-busting in New Zealand off to a huge start when they shattered two world record targets on Friday.

In the space of eight hours’ shearing, the pair smashed the women’s eight-hour solo and two-stand strong wool lamb records, with Whitehead’s tally being 25 more than what she shore to claim the nine-hour record two years ago.

The record attempts took place at Grant Brothers Tin House, in Otapiri-Mandeville Rd near Gore, between 7am and 5pm, with morning and afternoon tea breaks and lunch in between.

Whitehead sheared two-hour runs of 174, 171, 172 and 169 for a total of 686 — less than 42 seconds a lamb caught, shorn and dispatched — and McColl sheared 153, 144, 151 and 149 for a total of 597.

The combined total of 1283 beat the previous two-stand record of 903 for strong wool lambs set by mum-and-daughter duo Marg and Ingrid Baynes at Mangapehi near Bennydale on January 13, 2009.

Whitehead’s 686 also set a solo record, beating the 601 shorn by Sacha Bond on February 4 this year at Fairlight Station, Northern Southland.

Society secretary and records registrar Hugh McCarroll said it could have been more but Whitehead had three others discounted by the panel of five World Sheep Shearing Records Society referees, and McColl lost 10.

“That’s what we have referees for,” he said.

McColl was left marvelling at the women’s achievement.

“Megan was still running in and out of the catching pens at the end, just as she was at the beginning.”

It was enough to suggest there will be more for the 27-year-old Whitehead, whose nine-hour record of 661, shorn on January 14, 2021, will be challenged by Bond on Tuesday at Centrehill near Mossburn.

Previous two-stand record-holder Marg Baynes (centre), with new record-holders Megan Whitehead (left) and Hannah McColl. Photo / Kirstin Chittock

Friday’s attempts were the first of eight record bids so far scheduled in New Zealand this summer, with Bond’s big day out followed by Masterton shearers Paerata Abraham and Chris Dickson tackling the men’s eight-hour solo and two-stand records on Saturday, December 23, at Whitespurs east of Wairarapa township Gladstone.

McCarroll said the spate of record attempts, the most yet in a New Zealand season, sparked memories of the late 1970s.

The moment of realisation for cousins Hannah McColl (left) and Megan Whitehead, having set a women's two-stand record of 1283 strong wool lambs in eight hours. Photo / Charly

Then Samson (Hamahona) Te Whata, based on a record of 637 shorn by Jack Dowd in 1977, staged a ping-pong of six successful challenges for the nine-hour lamb record, raising the bar from Kaikohe gun Te Whata’s 650 in November 1979, to Te Kūiti master Fagan’s 804 in December 1980.

When Marg and Ingrid Baynes set the women’s eight-hour record 15 years ago, Ingrid established a solo record with a tally of 470.

Kerri-Jo Te Huia set a new mark of 507 at Te Hape, also near Bennydale, on January 10, 2012, New Zealand-based Canadian Pauline Bolay sheared 510 at Whitford Farms, Waikaretu, on December 7, 2019, and Bond added 91 to the record 10 months ago.

The equivalent men’s records are the solo mark of 754 shorn by Jack Fagan at Puketiti near Piopio on December 22 last year, two days after Reuben Alabaster sheared 744 to break a record that had stood for a decade; and the two-stand record of 1410 shorn by Simon Goss and Jamie Skiffington at The Glades, Mangamahu Valley, on January 4 this year, breaking a record that had endured for 20 years.

The end of the day for Hannah McColl, as Megan Whitehead finishes the last of her solo record of 686 lambs. Photo / Charly

Under revised rules established in 1983, a women’s nine-hour lamb record was established on January 6, 1989, when Jillian Angus Burney sheared 541 near Bennydale.

That record went unchallenged for almost 19 years before Emily Welch sheared 648 at Waikaretu on November 27, 2007.

Under a previous regime, Maureen Hyatt had shorn 569 near Mossburn on February 5, 1982.

The men’s record of 872 was shorn in Cornwall, England, on July 31, 2016, by Oxfordshire shearer Stuart Connor, who recently moved to New Zealand and is living in Hawke’s Bay.