Persistence and determination paid-off for Masterton woolhandler Pagan Rimene when she won her second New Zealand Corriedale Championships open title at the Canterbury Show in Christchurch last week.
From Masterton but raised around the woolsheds of Central Otago and Southland, 2006 Golden Shears senior champion Rimene hadn't qualified for the final in Christchurch since 2006, her first open final, and her first open-class win. A serious back injury in a shearing van crash which killed two workmates in 2008 had many wondering if she would ever compete again.
But she did, not only as a woolhandler, but also as a shearer, and scored a rare double by winning in both crafts at the Cheviot A&P Show in March 2013. Competing in the shadow of such competitors as prolific-winning 2012 world champion and reigning two-times Golden Shears Open champion Joel Henare, Rimene's only win the last 18 months had been in the national crossbred lambs championship final at Winton in January this year.
The placings at Christchurch were the same as at Winton, with Henare, from Gisborne but based in the South Island, where he also grew-up around the woolsheds of Otago, having to settle for second place, after 10-consecutive wins in finals since last March.
Third was Te Awamutu's Keryn Herbert, who next week represents New Zealand in a transtasman test in the Old Errowanbang Woolshed in Central NSW.
