Leon Samuels shearing in the Mackenzie Shears New Zealand Lamb Shearing Championships open final on Saturday, winning his ninth win in Shearing Sports New Zealand national titles events in the last four years. Photo / SSNZ
Leon Samuels shearing in the Mackenzie Shears New Zealand Lamb Shearing Championships open final on Saturday, winning his ninth win in Shearing Sports New Zealand national titles events in the last four years. Photo / SSNZ
Southland shearer Leon Samuels capped his biggest season with victory in the national lamb shearing championships open final at the Mackenzie Shears in Fairlie on Monday.
Samuels beat surprise runner-up Hugh De Lacy, of Rangiora, by 0.947pts, in the last event of the 2022-2023 Shearing Sports New Zealand season.
His victory came just nine days after a historic win in the New Zealand Shears open final in Te Kuiti, which claimed Sameuls a place in the New Zealand singlet at the Golden Shears World Shearing and Woolhandling Championships in Scotland on June 22-25.
It was also his ninth win in national title events in four seasons – after victories in the Otago Shears Open and South Island Shearer of the Year finals in 2020, the Otago Shears, the Southern Shears, the New Zealand Shears Circuit, PGG Wrightson Vetmed National Shearing Circuit and Waimate Shears New Zealand Spring Shearing Championships finals in 2021, and the Southern Shears final again, in February.
He has had just four other wins in New Zealand in an Open-class career dating back to 2012.
Monday’s win came after a six-man final with Samuels and Scotsman and Southern Hawke’s Bay farmer and shearer, Gavin Mutch heading the race for time honours.
Mutch was ultimately first by just over five seconds and completed the 19 lambs in 17min 7.25sec.
Third to finish was Te Kuiti shearer Jack Fagan, who won the crossbred lambs title in Winton in January.
De Lacy was next, but better quality points enabled him to claim second place overall.
Invercargill veteran Nathan Stratford completed his 26th season of open-class shearing with again the best quality points overall, to claim fourth place after shearing the 19 in 18min 45.47sec, Fagan was placed fifth and sixth was Pleasant Point shearer and contractor Ant Frew.
The Mackenzie Shears blades final lineup, with from left winner Tony Dobbs, runner-up Allan Oldfield and father Phil Oldfield, Tim Hogg and Shaun Burgess. Photo / SSNZ
North Island shearer Cory Barrowcliffe claimed his third win of the season in the senior final, by less than a point from runner-up Blake Crooks of Timaru, and the intermediate final was won by Dre Roberts, of Mataura, by just 0.0788pts from Emma Martin, of Gore, both stepping up to the intermediate grade after she won the New Zealand Shears junior final in Te Kuiti on April 1.
Last to finish the 6 lambs, she had easily the best quality points, but was not quite good enough to claim the title.
The junior final was won by Caleb Brooking, also of Mataura and who had scored his first win at the Oxford A and P Show nine days earlier, and the novice final, shorn as a Cleanshear, was won by Caleb Clark-Fleury, of Waimate.
Local blade shearer Tony Dobbs, with more than 40 years of shearing behind him, added to his list of over 100 blade shearing wins by turning the tables on Allan Oldfield, from Geraldine, who had won the blades final at Oxford the previous weekend.
Dobbs had earlier this season won blades titles at Waimate and Ashburton.
Results from the Mackenzie Shears, at the 125th anniversary Mackenzie Aand P Show, Fairlie, on Monday, April 10, 2023
Open final (19 lambs): Leon Samuels (Invercargill/Roxburgh) 17min 12.69sec, 62.7398pts, 1; Hugh De Lacy (Rangiora) 17min 31.63sec, 63.6868pts, 2; Gavin Mutch (Scotland/Dannevirke) 17min 7.25sec, 64.4678pts, 3; Nathan Stratford (Invercargill) 18min 45.47sec, 64.8524pts, 4; Jack Fagan (Te Kuiti) 17min 20.03sec, 65.7099pts, 5; Ant Frew (Pleasant Point) 19min 11.64sec, 68.0557pts, 6.
