An awesome experience

Gisborne bowling twins Kyle (left) and Liam Pinn gained invaluable experience against older opponents at the national under-21 singles championship at Naenae Bowling Club. Picture supplied

Gisborne bowling twins Kyle and Liam Pinn returned from the national under-21 singles championship at Naenae Bowling Club without a title but with a wealth of memories and big-game experience.

The 13-year-old Kahutia Bowling Club members are only fifth-year junior players but have taken part in numerous open tournaments, and won club championships and centre champion of champions junior titles.

This was their first appearance in the national under-21 champs, and they were the youngest players in the tournament.

Their father, Geoff Pinn, was their manager for the event.

In section play, Kyle Pinn beat Alex McGinty (Wellington) 21-7, Tessa Stokes (Wairarapa) 21-8 and Lily Signal (Stokes Valley) 21-15.

In post-section play, Kyle led for most of his game against Taranaki senior rep Nathan Goodin, but Goodin­­­ —­ the eventual third-placegetter — finished strongly to win 21-17.

Liam did not make it to post-section play, but in a fifth-round match against eventual tournament winner Briar Atkinson (Taranaki) he led 7-3 after eight ends. They were level at 16-all, and then Atkinson pulled away to win.

The goodwill and sportsmanship extended by Goodin and Atkinson towards their young Gisborne opponents was awesome to see.