Woolhandling Master Gina Nathan dies

Reigning New Zealand woolhandling champion Gina Nathan died in the South Island overnight.

Recognised by Shearing Sports New Zealand as a Master Woolhandler, she won the Golden Shears open woolhandling title in 2005 and 2006, and won her first New Zealand open title in Te Kuiti last March, completing a 2007-2008 season in which she also won the prestige New Zealand Spring Shears title in Waimate and the Southern Shears titlle in Gore.

Illness prevented her from taking her place at last month's Southern Shears, where she was to have competed in an inter-island match.

Expected to be taken home for a tangi at Te Hauke in Hawke's Bay on Saturday, she had for many years been based in Alexandria where she won her first New Zealand Fine Wool open woolhandling title in 1992, one of many titles she had won in an open-class woolhandling career stretching back more than 16 years.

ENDS