Competitive fire burning brightly

Ray Young ready for touch judge duties at Rugby Park. Now bowls takes up much of his leisure time. Picture by Liam Clayton

Ever since Ray Young teamed up with Bill Scott and Joe Lockwood to win a mercantile tournament at Kahutia Bowling Club, he knew he would return to bowls.

He would have started earlier, but he had to have both hips replaced, and then one had to be redone six years after it was first replaced.

Time passed, and Ray Smith at Plumbing World told him he was “full of it” and would never play bowls. So a year later, hip problems behind him, he took up the game. That was three years ago.

“I knew I would enjoy it, but I’ve got to enjoy it even more because every year you get better,” Ray Young said.

The comradeship is “incredible”, he says, but it is the competitive side of the sport that excites him.

“It’s a real thinking game. You have to nut so many things out . . . about every green you go to, every person you play against or with, and the weather.”

Ray played rugby in his youth, and was the regular halfback for High School Old Boys for most of the 1970s, when Poverty Bay could give big-name teams a hurry-up.

In 1974 he was training with the representative squad and was picked to play against Bay of Plenty, but had to pull out with a back injury.

In 1972, as a 19-year-old, Ray had helped HSOB win the Lee Bros Shield, symbol of local club rugby supremacy. The following year he played for the Olympians — alongside All Blacks Blair Furlong and Ian MacRae and some top Auckland players — against Poverty Bay, scoring one try and almost scoring what could have been the winner.

He remembers the influence of coaches like Garry Thompson, Peter Florence, Pat McQuillan and Brian Cairns, but some of his other memories are not so clear.

“I had a lot of concussions on the way,” he said.

“The ambulance was on the field twice, and I had two other major knocks.

“My last game was about 1981, against Rangatira at Te Karaka. One of my best mates, Barry Hyland, was heading for the tryline, and I wasn’t about to let him score. I stopped the try but they carted me off, concussed. That was the final straw.”

Ray coached HSOB teams for six years — at under-19, u21 and senior reserve level, the highlight being the u19s’ undefeated title-winning season of 1985. He also managed lower-grade HSOB teams and — for two years — the HSOB premier team in a period that included a championship win under the guidance of coach Craig Wilkie.

Ray started refereeing in 1990 and still controls junior games and serves as touch judge in premier matches. Administration and referee coaching also keep him busy.

At 65, he picks and chooses his plumbing jobs, and if an enticing game of bowls comes up, he puts the work aside.