Marton shearer Jimmy Samuels wins his second Rural Games speed shear title. Photo / NZ Rural Games
Reigning World Champion blade shearer Allan Oldfield moved a step closer to defending his title this year when he won the sixth round of the eight-show Mark Marshall Memorial Blades Circuit at the Mayfield A and P Show Shears in Mid-Canterbury on Saturday.
In a four-man final of five sheep each, Oldfield put on the same trademark pace he applied in ending the African dominance of international blade shearing when he took part in a World Championships for the first time in France in 2019.
From Geraldine in South Canterbury, but now living in the Hutt Valley, Oldfield shore the sheep in 15min 27sec, a minute and 23 seconds quicker than runner-up Tim Hogg, of Timaru, to total 53.15pts and claim a winning margin of 3.35pts separating the pair in the final count.
Third was Oldfield’s World Champion teams partner, veteran Tony Dobbs, of Fairlie, who shore the five in 17min 24sec, and finished with 59.2pts.
Fourth was Oldfield’s father, former New Zealand World Championships representative Phil Oldfield.
The circuit doubles as the Wools of New Zealand Shearing Sports New Zealand selection series to find two blade shearers for the 2023 Golden Shears World Shearing and Woolhandling Championships.
With two rounds remaining, at Oxford on April 1 and Fairlie’s Mackenzie show on Easter Monday, Oldfield, now with three wins, has a one-point series lead from Dobbs, with a gap opening up to the next best, and little to stop the pair becoming the representatives to defend the title.
Meanwhile, North Canterbury shearer Hugh De Lacy bounced back from a Golden Shears 22nd-place Top 30 quarterfinal shootout exit seven days earlier, to win the Mayfield open machine-shearing final, shorn over 14 sheep.
It was De Lacy’s second win of the season, having triumphed at the Ellesmere A and P Shears in October.
The runner-up on Saturday was Paul Hodges, from Geraldine, while third place went to Pleasant Point shearer and contractor Ant Frew, to whom De Lacy had been runner-up at Rangiora’s Northern A and P Show shears in October, and the Duvauchelle Peninsula Shears, which restarted the Shearing Sports New Zealand season after the Christmas-New Year break.
In the North Island, Kaiwaka shearer Toa Henderson bounced back from his semi-final exit at the Golden Shears to score his eighth win of the season in a final at the Kumeu Summer Shears near Auckland.
The runner-up was Gavin Mutch, travelling from Dannevirke, and Jack Fagan, from Te Kuiti, came third.
The senior final was won by Jayden Mainland, of Wellsford, and the intermediate by English shearer Callum Bosley.
Henderson and Fagan then headed for Palmerston North and Sunday’s Ford Ranger New Zealand Rural Games Norwood Speed Shear Championship, which produced its second double champion in eight years with Marton shearer Jimmy Samuels’ triumph over Mataura gun Brett Roberts in the final.
While Roberts produced the fastest time of 17.06sec in the semi-final stages, as the invitation field dwindled round by round from its original muster of 10 of New Zealand’s fastest shearers, 2018 winner Samuels, who had 17.16sec in the semi-final, got the upper-hand in a final over two sheep each, with a time of 39.16sec.
Roberts shore his pair in 42.72sec.
One feature of the afternoon was Otorohanga veteran Digger Balme’s 17.74 sec shearing in the last six, at the age of 58 and in his 37th season of open-class shearing.
With defending champion and only previous two-times winner Fagan eliminated at that stage, along with fellow leading hope Paerata Abraham, of Masterton, Balme was out too in the 4th round – the semi-final – as was Henderson.
Meanwhile, Sacha Bond, of Piopio, beat new Rural Sportswoman of the Year and fellow World Record holder Megan Whitehead, of Gore, in a women’s match.
Bond had the upper hand in both shears, with 27.12sec firstly for a single sheep then 57.34sec for a pair ending the showdown. Whitehead produced times of 28.5sec and 65.22sec.