World championships third placegetter Nathan Stratford had his third win in a row this season when he won the Pleasant Point Gymkhana Shears Open final in South Canterbury on Saturday (yesterday).
It was Stratford's fourth win in the event, but his first there for eight years. Now in his 21st season of Open-class shearing, he won at Pleasant Point in 2001, 2008 and 2009, when he beat North Island shearing legend David Fagan, who won the title early in his last season of competition in 2014.
This time, Fagan's son, Jack, fresh from his first Open-final win in New Zealand seven days earlier at the Wairarapa show, was the only shearer in the four-man, 18-sheep final to go under a minute a sheep. But he had to settle for third place overall, yielding to the better quality of both Stratford and fellow Southland veteran Darin Forde, while local Ant Frew was fourth.
There was a blast from the past in the Senior final which was won by Hamish Anderson, of Timaru, who had rarely figured on the competition scene since winning eight finals and reaching a Golden Shears final as an Intermediate shearer in 2001.
His lack of recent finals seemed to matter little as he beat form shearers Linton Palmer, winner of Great Raihania Shears Senior title in Hastings 15 days earlier, Luis Pincol, who was looking for a third win in a row this season, and Mitchell Murray, looking for his first Senior win after seven in the Intermediate grade last season.
