Golden Shears World Championships to bring 26 countries to Masterton

New Zealand-based Scotland international Gavin Murch after winning the World Championship in Masterton in 2012. He'll be back for another bid in Masterton in March. Photo / Pete Nikolaison

At least 26 countries will be represented at the 20th Golden Shears World Shearing and Woolhandling Championships in Masterton on March 4-7.

Golden Shears International Shearing Championships president Trish Stevens said that, as of this week, registrations include 51 machine shearers, 31 blade shearers and 40 woolhandlers.

With a deadline approaching Monday, 12 countries have registered the full complement of two in each classification.

They will be among more than 630 competitors individually entered in the Golden Shears alongside the world title events, making it possibly the biggest shearing sports event worldwide since Masterton first staged its annual showpiece in 1961.

The “Goldies”, as they are affectionately known by competitors, had immediate success, spawning a UK Golden Shears in 1963, an Australian Golden Shears in 1974, and the World Championships, first held in England in 1977.

Hundreds of others from overseas will also be in Masterton, making the Golden Shears the Holy Grail of a summer spent working, holidaying, and, in many cases, competing in novice to open shearing and woolhandling events in dozens of mainly smaller towns and localities throughout New Zealand.

But many will miss out on being spectators at the action-packed final night in the War Memorial Stadium, where the Golden Shears have been held every year since its inception, except for Covid cancellations in 2021 and 2022.

Stevens said tickets for the Friday night, featuring the three teams finals, and the Saturday night, featuring the three individual finals, plus the Masterton Golden Shears open shearing and woolhandling finals, had quickly sold out when they went on sale in the first week of September.

A marquee will be erected nearby in Queen Elizabeth Park for overflow events and big-screen coverage of the events in the stadium.

She said her host committee is anticipating possibly two more countries, meeting her own hopes of 26-28 nations, when the committee started planning for the fifth time Masterton has staged the championships.

Staged in nine countries over the years, they have been held in the Wairarapa town in 1980, 1988, 1996 and 2012, with one other appearance in New Zealand, in Invercargill in 2017.

“We think that number of countries is pretty good, especially considering what’s going on around the world at the moment,” she said.

Most of the competitors have already been named, but the New Zealand team won’t be finalised until the selection series end in February, four weeks before the final day of the championships.

South Canterbury shearers and 2019 blades champions Allan Oldfield and Tony Dobbs confirmed their places in a blades series that ended at Christchurch on November 15.

New Zealand had won at least one title in every World Championships until the most recent at the Royal Highland Show in Scotland in 2023, when 31 countries were represented.

Among those representing their countries is Hawke’s Bay-based farmer and shearer Gavin Mutch, who proudly wore the kilt of his native Scotland when he was hailed as winner of the glamour individual machine shearing title in Masterton in 2012, when he was farming near Whangamōmona, Taranaki.