A beautiful Gisborne Saturday on the Kahutia Bowling Club greens was enjoyed by players competing in the Bowls Gisborne East Coast centre open pairs tournament. Photo / Steve Goldsbury
A beautiful Gisborne Saturday on the Kahutia Bowling Club greens was enjoyed by players competing in the Bowls Gisborne East Coast centre open pairs tournament. Photo / Steve Goldsbury
Two high-quality finals provided the perfect finish for the Bowls Gisborne-East Coast Centre men’s and women’s pairs at the weekend.
Both winning pairs were from the host Kahutia Bowling Club.
Leighton Shanks (skip) and July Hoepo won the Weatherley Brothers Memorial Trophy when they beat Te Karaka duoDavid File and Shaun Goldsbury 13-12 in a game that came down to centimetres.
Bowls Gisborne East Coast's centre open men's pairs champions July Hoepo (left) and Leighton Shanks of Kahutia Bowling Club.
Shanks and Hoepo were half of the winning team in the J. J. Martin Memorial Cup tournament for centre men’s fours two weeks before.
Glenys Whiteman (s) and Dayvinia Mills won the Bowls New Zealand President’s Trophy when they beat Tolaga Bay sisters Clara (s) and Mary Taingahue 14-12 in a match that had onlookers wanting a few more ends of the same quality.
Midway through the men’s final, Shanks and Hoepo were ahead 8-4, but File and Goldsbury bounced back to lead 9-8.
Shanks replied with a three to lead 11-9 but by the 15th end it was all square at 12-12.
Steady lead bowls from Hoepo and accurate finishing from Shanks got the job done for the Kahutia pair. Even so, File’s last bowl was only about a centimetre shy of claiming the shot.
Shanks and Hoepo were seeded eighth after Saturday qualifying and in their first knockout match beat ninth seeds Boon McIlroy (s) and Mark Walker, of Tolaga Bay, 15-10.
They then beat sixth qualifiers Kyle (s) and Liam Pinn – the other half of their J. J. Martin winning four – 14-11 in the quarter-final.
In the semifinal, they had an 18-9 victory over Gisborne Bowling Club’s Malcolm Trowell (s) and Chris Bunyan, who had qualified third.
File and Goldsbury qualified second from Saturday play. After that, they beat Kahutia pair Joe Wimutu (s) and Puna McRoberts 18-1, Poverty Bay’s Keith Tamanui (s) and Barrie Denham 16-12, and – in the semifinal – Gisborne’s Charlie Ure (s) and Tim Sherriff 17-9.
Top qualifiers from Saturday were Tolaga Bay’s Vern Alder (s) and Shane Smiler, who reached the quarter-finals, where Ure and Sherriff beat them 23-11.
One of the most absorbing games of the tournament was the quarter-final between Trowell and Bunyan and their Gisborne clubmates Andrew Ball (s) and Warren Gibb.
Spectators were pleased to see Gibb back on the greens after years of success with indoor bowls. He and Ball led 13-12 going into the last end, but Trowell had saved his best for last.
He drew two top-drawer shots to take the match 14-13.
Bowls Gisborne East Coast centre women's open pairs champions Dayvinia Mills (left) and Glenys Whiteman, of Kahuita Bowling Club, with GEC centre president Jon Davies.
In the women’s final, the Taingahue sisters opened the scoring with a single on the first end.
Whiteman and Mills responded with four shots on the next end, which set them up for the rest of the match. At seven ends, they led 10-5.
Nevertheless, Clara and Mary Taingahue mounted a spirited rally that closed the gap to two shots by the end. It was the closest anyone had got to Whiteman and Mills during the tournament.
The Taingahue sisters’ semifinal against the other sisters in the draw, Poverty Bay’s Anita Vaotuua (s) and Jessie Davis-Law, attracted a lot of interest among spectators. It ended 18-9.
The Taingahue sisters’ quarter-final against Gisborne’s Delores Woodcock (s) and Jackie Horsfall ended 21-8.
Whiteman and Mills made their way to the final by way of a 19-8 victory over Poverty Bay’s Kathryn Flaugere (s) and Lesley Seymour, and a 19-5 semifinal win against Gisborne’s Ginny Sherriff (s) and Libby Clay.
