Kiwi World champs hope Oldfield wins blades title at Reefton

Kiwi World champs hope Oldfield wins blades title at Reefton

Geraldine bladeshearer Phil Oldfield had an important win ahead of this week’s World shearing and woolhandling championships when he beat an international field to regain the Reefton Shears bladeshearing at the Inangahua A and P Show on Saturday.
While teammate Tony Dobbs and three African hopes for the World championships in Invercargill from Wednesday to next Saturday did not make the trip to the West Coast, there was a significant field of 18 bladeshearers and an otherwise all-overseas final of three lambs each in which Oldfield beat Peter Heraty, of Co Mayo, Ireland, Australian shearer Ken French, of Glenisla, Vic, and Noel Joyce, of Finnie, Ireland.
Oldfield, who won at Reefton two years ago, had to be good on the four-stand board beneath the Reefton Racecourse red-top today, after a top performance by French in the semi-finals, when he had just nine penalties in the pens, when the next best was Heraty’s 25.
But French accurately predicted he wouldn’t “get two like that again” and stacked-up the penalties in the final, in which he was however first to finish, while Heraty, mentored by Oldfield over recent years, incurred just four faults in the board judging.
Among those eliminated in the semi-finals was England shearing identity George Mudge, who by the end of the week will have shorn in 11 of the 17 World championships since the first championships in England in 1977.
Now aged 69, he made his championships debut in the second celebration in Masterton in 1980 in the machine shearing, in which he reached the final next championships up in England in 1984. He retired soon afterwards but came back in 1998 as a bladeshearer, in which he was sixth in the final at the last World championships in Ireland three years ago.
Marlborough farmer Chris Jones won the 20-sheep Open machine shearing final today, and then told younger shearers to stick around because there’s hope for them all.
A prolific winner over the years on the Marlborough-Nelson circuit, he said: “I’ve been coming here at least 25 years now, I’m 59 next week, and I’ve never won any of the classes at this show.”
The shears attracted 47 shearers across the grades, the greatest number being, uniquely, in the blades event.
The machine-shearing also attracted a small number of World championships entrants, with Takaka-based Mongolia national Enkhnasan Chuluunbaatar finishing second in the Senior final, and the Intermediate final being won by Canterbury-based Japan representative Shun Oishi, who will be the only competitor contesting the machine shearing, bladeshearing and woolhandling at the World Championships in ILT Stadium Southland.
But the biggest effort of the day at Reefton was that of competition organiser Sam Win, who, widely acclaimed for putting the event on and keeping it going, providing his own marquee and spending the last three days helping erecting the stand he once bought from the Canterbury Show, shore in the Open machine heats, semi-final and Plate final, and then teamed with Chuluunbaatar in a teams event he staged to put on primarily for World Championships entries who made the trip across country I n preference to other competitions being held in Marton and Balclutha.
Wearing a black wig and moustached to add some reality to the situation as he wore the blue singlet of the Mongolia national side, he was faced with almost the ultimate question from an admiring fan at the end.
“Grand-dad, what are you doing?” said seven-year-old Bethany Win.
Resullts from the Reefton Shears at Inangahua A and P Show, Reefton Racecourse, Saturday, February 4, 2017:
Open final (20 lambs): Chris Jones (Blenheim) 20min 52.57sec, 80.28pts, 1; Paul Hodges (Geraldine) 22min 24.72sec, 80.54pts, 2; Fave Brooker (Hawarden) 21min 32.44sec, 81.32pts, 3; Jotham Rentoul (Tapawera) 22min 35.65sec, 86.58pts, 4.
Open Plate (8 lambs): Nick Nalder (Takaka) 8min 44.56sec, 41.48pts, 1; Osmund Kringeland (Norway) 9min 51.79sec, 47.96pts, 2; Frank Bint (Tapawera) 10min 30.06sec, 48.75pts, 3; SamWin (Ikamatua) 8min 50.59sec, 54.53pts, 4.
Senior final (8 lambs): Hugh De Lacy (Cheviot) 10min 18.03sec,47.65pts, 1; Enkhnasan Chuluunbaatar (Mongolia/Takaka) 12min 6.5sec, 49.83sec, 2.
Intermediate final (4 lambs): Shun Oishi (Japan) 7min 5.85sec, 37.04pts, 1; Duncan Higgins (Havelock) 7min 41.5sec, 40.83pts; Sarah Higgins (Havelock) 7min 48.6sec, 42.43pts, 3; Aaron Win (Reefton) 8min 39.85sec, 53.99pts, 4.
Junior final (3 lambs): Liam Norrie (Cheviot) 7min 52.75sec, 41.64pts, 1; Lucas Taia (Dovedale) 9min 11.72sec, 58.92pts, 2; Emma Hodgkinson (Tapawera) 10min 58.37sec, 72.92pts, 3; John Wylie (Golden Bay) 8min 40.65sec, 79.37pts, 4.
Bladeshearing final (3 lambs): Phil Oldfield (Geraldine) 11min 17.29sec, 52.2pts, 1; Peter Heraty (Ireland) 11min 57.43sec, 55.87pts, 2; Ken French (Australia) 10min 58.91sec, 57.28pts, 3; Noel Joyce (Ireland) 13min 13.38sec, 78pts, 4.
Cleanshear (2 lambs): Paul Hodges (Geraldine) 8pts, 1; Dave Brooker (Hawarden) 9.5pts, 2; Chris Jones (Blenheim) 13pts, 3; Jotham Rentoul (Tapawera) 14pts, 4.
Teams (6 lambs): New Zealand (Paul Hodges/Jotham Rentoul) 6min 35.59sec, 35.61pts, 1; Mongolia (Enkhnasan Chuluunbaatar/Sam Win) 7min 13.19sec, 43.33pts, 2; Norway (Osmund Kringeland/Aaron Win) 9min 22.57sec, 51.63pts, 3; Japan (Shun Oishi/Masakuni Osawada) 11min 33.47sec, 62.67pts, 4.
ENDS

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