Herbert retains Southern Shears woolhandling title

Herbert retains Southern Shears woolhandling title

Te Awamutu woolhandler Keryn Herbert retained her Southern Shears Open title as the first-day of the shear’s 50th anniversary championships ended in Gore today.

A current New Zealand Transtasman series representative and back in front of the Shearing Sports New Zealand open-class rankings, Herbert won the final from Milton woolhandler Monica Potae, with Larnie Morrell, of Masterton, third.

The three faced a tough fullwool contest working for two shearers each simultaneously.

A Master Woolhandler, it was only Hebert’s fourth win in 14 finals this season, having often had to toil in the shadow of two-times Golden Shears winner and 2012 World Champion Joel Henare, who on Saturday in Balclutha scored his seventh win of the season.

Henare, in a field of 22 who started in today’s heats, was eliminated in the semi-finals, on a day Herbert rated quite unlike any other she had ever seen in woolhandling competition.

She said the abilities of younger competitors in the lower grades and the crowd response was “awesome,” and the fleece-throwing of a high quality all-round.

Her next competition will be at the Taumarunui Jamboree Shears on February 27, one of three events leading into the Golden Shears a week later, when she hopes to win a Golden Shears title for the first time.

Milton woolhandler Cherie Peterson won the senior final, by just 0.352pts from Otago Shears senior winner Steve Mason-Smallman, of Taihape. It was one of the smallest winning margins ever in a woolhandling competition.

The experience of growing up in the woolsheds of Southland paid-off for Mataura teenager Nova Kumeroa-Elers who after a handful of competitions had his first victory in the Junior final.

The 19-year-old turned the tables on Junior rankings leader Chiquita Tamepo, by whom he was beaten by just one-and-a-half points in his best previous result at the national Crossbred Lambs shearing and woolhandling championships at Winton five weeks ago.

The Southern Shears continue tonight (Friday) with a Speedshear at Gore’s Excelsior Rugby Club, followed by a full day of novice, junior, intermediate senior and open-class shearing tomorrow.

It will include the expected last South Island competition appearance of Te Kuiti legend David Fagan, whose first win in a 37-year-competiton career was in an intermediate lambs final at nearby Riversdale in 1979.

Results of Woolhandling events on the first day of the 50th Southern Shears in Gore on Friday-Saturday February 20-21:

Open final: Keryn Herbert (Te Awamutu) 293.47pts, 1; Larnie Morrell (Masterton) 304.612pts, 2; Monica Potae (Milton) 364.44pts, 3.

Senior final: Cherie Peterson (Milton) 183.104pts, 1; Stevie Mason-Smallman (Taihape) 183.456pts, 2; Ebony Turipa (Gore) 193.294pts, 3; Krystal Schimanski (Gore) 364.16pts, 4.

Junior final: Nova Kumeroa-Elers (Mataura) 129.05pts, 1; Chiquita Tamepo (Tolaga Bay) 151.464pts, 2; Peketai Puna (Napier) 202.582pts, 3; Shani Newton (Gore) 349.006pts, 4.

ENDS

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