Club bowls news

JUNIOR WOMEN: Gisborne Bowling Club’s junior women’s triples champions are (from left) Adrienne Torrie, Karen Pinn (skip) and Libby Clay.Pictures supplied

Winning teams in Gisborne Bowling Club’s junior and senior women’s triples championships had a familiar look about them.

In the junior women’s competition for players with up to eight years’ bowling experience, skip Karen Pinn and director Adrienne Torrie won the title for the third year in a row. The new member of their team, lead Libby Clay, came into the team last year when Torrie had to pull out of the centre champion of champions tournament with a knee injury.

The team of Pinn, Clay and Nanette Treloar won last year’s centre title, but in this year’s club junior triples final Treloar was skipping their opponents.

Only two teams contested the club’s junior women’s section — Pinn’s team and Treloar’s (with Joy McFarlane as director and Sally Knight as lead).

Pinn’s team won the first game 20-10 and the second 23-4 to clinch the junior triples championship with two lives still intact.

In the senior women’s section, Queenie Takurua’s team staged a great comeback to win the title for the second successive year.

In the potential final, two-lifers Takurua (skip), Dayvinia Mills (director) and Age Smiler (lead) faced Tanya Harrison (skip), Dianne Phillips (director) and Emily Hongara (lead).

Harrison’s team led comfortably until Takurua’s team took six shots on one end to close the gap to one point.

On the last end, Takurua played a run shot that moved the jack and took two shots. Harrison tried to take the shot but was unsuccessful, and Takurua’s team won the game 16-15, with their two lives intact.

In the junior men’s section for players with up to eight years’ bowls experience, Don Oates (skip), Steve Ward (director) and Ron Robertson (lead) lost their first game 15-14 to Geoff Pinn (skip), Peter Ferris (director) and Chris Bunyan (lead) but won their second game 18-7 against the same opponents.

In the final round, both teams had one life left and played awesome bowls contesting some close ends.

Oates’s team continued to play well — Ward’s run shots were a scoring feature throughout — and they claimed the club men’s junior title with a 17-14 win.

In the senior men’s section, Arthur Hawes (skip), Tim Sherriff (director) and Bruce Easton (lead) faced Charlie Ure (skip), Boon McIlroy (director) and Peter Clay (lead) in the potential final.

The Hawes team won the game 22-14 and so won the title with two lives intact.

All four winning teams will represent Gisborne Bowling Club in the centre champion of champions triples at Wairoa Bowling Club on March 12 and 13.