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Fagan triumphs in one last southern raid

Fagan triumphs in one last southern raid

Shearing legens David Fagan had Southern Shears officials rubbing their eyes in disbelief as a computer points-scoring system rounded off one of the more amazing days of an amazing career and named him a winner of their Open final tonight.

In his last competition shear in the South Island, the 53-year--old Fagan completed a Southern Shears Open and South Island Shearer of the Year double, led New Zealand to a comfortable Elders Primary Wool test match win over Wales and featured in a North Island team which won a bi-annual inter-island shearing match.

It was his 12th win in the Open final, and seventh in the Shearer of the Year final, each of which he last won in 2001, and one official said that when scoring officers showed her the printout they each stood agape, and made sure they confitrmed it’s correctness again.

Including heats and other stages leading to his swansong triumphs, the 53-year-old Fagan shore 91 sheep in a combined total of about 87 minutes of shearing during the day, in which he first shore mid-morning and pressed the red-button for one last time at almost 9pm.

Possibly most stunning after such a day was that in the last hour he was first to finish on both of the 20-sheep, six-man finals. He shore the open final in 17min 2.. 55secs, 20 seconds quicker than runner-up Diuon King, of Hastings, and he completed the Shearer of the Year final in 17min 49.72secs, close to a sheep ahead of next-man-finished and Soputhland veteran Darin Forde, who has seen only one other South Island shearer win the Shearer of the Year title since he won in 2003..

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After a range of presentations at the end of the shears’ two-day 50th anniversary event, including a standing ovation after the test-match win was announced, Fagan conceded the number of sheep and time taken probably made it his busiest single day in a competition career dating back to his first competition win as an Intermediate lambshearer in January 1979 at Riversdale, also in Southland.

The Southern Shears in 1983 provided what was only the second of what is now a total of 636 open-class wins, about three times as many as the next most successful competition shearers in the World.

The double was a big a huge success just two weeks out from his bid to win a 17th and final Golden Shears open title in Masterton on March 7, and seven weeks from his expected last competiton at the New Zealand Shearing Championships in Te Kuiti on April 11.

“Southland has been good to me,” he told the crowd on a night which turned into a testimonial for a man the shearing and farming World regards as New Zealand’s most prolific and enduring winner in sport.

“But I won’t be back,” he said, reaffirming his retirement plans.

Welsh team manager Bill Jones urged Fagan to make himself available for one final test series in the UK this year, saying: “In Wales, David Fagan is like God.”

Southern Shears Open runner-up, two-times winner and 2006 Golden Shears champion Dion King, of Hastings, said: “I told him, before the final, I didn’t mind coming second to him.”

Forde was also third in the Open final, which no South Island shearer has won since 1994.

The Fagan triumphs tended to overshadow other successes headed by 23-year-old Masterton shearer Ethan Pankurst’s ninth senior win of the season, one more than Fagan has had in the Open class.

Five of Fagan’s wins this season have been in the South Island.

The Intermediate and Junior finals were won respectively by Marley Waihape, 18, of Mataura, and 15-year-old Hemi Lambert, of Raupunga, both having also won at the prestigious Otago Shears near Balcluth last week.

ENDS


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