Emotional Shears Win For Otago Veteran

Veteran Otago shearer Chris Vickers has had possibly his biggest moment in 37 years of shearing by winning the 63rdNew Zealand Merino Shears Open final in Alexandra on Saturday night.

The win came in a six-man final with the opposition comprising four who have been acclaimed Master Shearer and an Australian hopeful who even at the age of 28 was less than half the age of the winner, who was not the oldest in the field.

Just the third win ever for the 56-year-old from Shag Point, near Palmerston and north of Dunedin, it was a title he was determined to get, to claim a place in the Shearing Sports New Zealand team for this month’s trasntasman test in West Australian shearing hub Katanning, less than 60km from Wagin, where he first started Australian shearing as a 20-year-old for uncle David Iles.

When he first shore 100 in a day on the big ewes the workmates asked why he was shouting “three” boxes, instead of one.

He told them he’d done 69 on his first day, but it took three weeks to get to the magic three-figure tally, but he’s shorn many seas in Australia since.

Harking right back to the early days he wanted to win so “all the family and mates” could come to the test, and, showing the respect and for extra motivation throughout the day in Alexandra, he wore under his show singlet a singlet produced in memory of cousin Chris Iles, who died three years ago from cancer.

As an extra touch, when he needed a headband, he borrowed one from one of the youngsters in the Teddy Bear Shear held earlier in the day.

Vickers’ first “win” was actually in a transtasman test match, after he won a place in the annual home-and-away series after finishing runner-up and first eligible-for-selection New Zealander when Australian shearer Damian Boyle won the Alexandra final for a third time in 2012.

Australia won the ensuing Australian leg by just 1.48pts at Warrnambool, Vic., with Vickers second-best individual behind only South Australian legend Shannon Warnest, but with Hawke’s Bay gun John Kirkpatrick and Marlborough shearer Angus Moore he then helped stop Australia from making it four-in-a-row, by winning a test at the 2013 Golden Shears in Masterton.

It was soon afterwards that he had his only other individual show win, in Tasmania.

Saturday became a special day for New Zealand’s only finewool shearing championships, Vickers qualifying 6th of 24 for the quarterfinals, 10th of 12 for the semi-finals, and third going into a final which could have doubled as an invitation of the merino shearing all-stars.

They left behind many top other hopes, including defending champion Leon Samuels, of Roxburgh, who was eliminated in the quarterfinals, which he had reached as just 22nd of the 24 qualifiers – an ironic end for a man later recognised later in the days as the most recent to be acclaimed a Master Shearer.

Also eliminated along the way were new New Zealand team teammates Jack Fagan of Te Kuiti, who disappeared in the semi-finals, and Moore, who missed the cut from the heats.

Second to finish the final of 12 sheep each, Vickers did enough with the quality and time points to claim the honours by more than three points from first-man-off and pocket-rocket James Fagan, of Te Kuiti, who in 2008, his 5th final, became a rare finewool winner from the strongwool competitions if the North Island.

Third place went to 61-year-old Central Otago shearing contractor Dion Morrell, a four-times winner and the top-qualifier from the semi-final and into the final for a 12th time, spanning 28 years.

Five-times winner and Invercargill shearer Nathan Stratford, in the final for a 20th time, was 4th,28-year-old Sam Mackrill, of Shepparton, Vic., 5th, and 6th was Rakaia shearing contractor, former title winner and 13-times Alexandra finalist Grant Smith.

Pagan Rimene provided a Central Otago triumph when she won the Open woolhandling title for a 5th time, having won in 2015, 2016 and 2018 and been runner-up twice since last winning of the event in 2019.

Daughter of Dion Morrell and former Golden Shears Open woolhandling champion Tina Rimene,

Rimene also claimed a place in the transtasman series, where she will be out to extend her unbeaten record in New Zealand teams after she and Taihape woolhandler Sheree Alabaster won the World teams title in France in 2019 and then transtasman tests in Dubbo, NSW, and Masterton in the ensuing summer.

With more than 30 Open final wins to her name, she was last to finish Saturday’s final, to card the highest time points, but being about a sixth of the total, her expertise with the board job, oddments and fleece points gave her a winning margin of almost 50 over runner-up and Alexandra-based Foonie Waihape, originally from Gisborne.

Third was Monica Potae, from Kennedy Bay, and fourth was four-times Alexandra winner Joel Henare, from Gisborne.

With 41 in the heats, Rimene was 7th in qualifying for the semi-final, which saw the elimination of defending champion Tia Potae, but which saw go intoi the final with the No 1 ranking.

Rimene is planning two months in Australia to be back in New Zealand for mainshear and a run at the New Zealand 2026 World Championships selection series.

West Australian shearer Danielle Mauger, in her first season in the South Island, carried on almost from where she left-off last season in the north when she became the third woman to win the Merino Shears’ Senior shearing title.

Shearing the four sheep in 12m 22.62s, she was third to finish, over a minute after defending champion and King Country shearer Aiden Tarrant, of Piopio, but strung together match-winning quality to claim victory by 2.345pts from the eventual runner-up, Tarrant’s brother, Taelor Tarrant. Third place went to Shaun Goosen, from Phillippolis, Free State, South Africa.

Mauger hit near immediate form after arriving in New Zealand last season and won four Intermediate finals on second-shear strongwool sheep in February, at Dannevirke, Aria, Te Puke and Taumarunui.

The last female to win the Merino Shears Senior final was Te Atakura Crawford, from Te Karaka, in 2013, and Jils Angus Burney, from Feilding, who won in 1985 and was present to see Saturday’s finals.

Other winners were Autumn Waihape, of Mataura, in the Senior woolhandling final, and first-timer Miria Hohepa, from Napier, in the Junior final.

The championships attracted 145 individual entries, with 91 in the two shearing grades and 74 across the three woolhandling grades, a combined increase of 11 on last year.

It was the first of 57 shows on the 2024-2025 Shearing Sports New Zealand calendar. The Merino Shears is one of 11 stand-alone shearing sports events, the rest being mainly A and P show dates.

The busy season continues with the Waimate Shears New Zealand Spring Shearing and Woolhandling Championships next Friday and Saturday, and on October 19 the Gisborne Shearing and Woolhandling Championships at the Poverty Bay A and P Show and the Ellesmere A and P Show’s shearing-only competitions at Leeston, south of Christchurch.

The Hawke’s Bay A and P Show’s Great Rahania Shears are on October 24, and the Northern A and P Shears are at Rangiora the following day.

RESULTS from the 63 New Zealand Merino Shears shearing and woolhandling championships at Molyneux Stadium, Alexandra on Friday-Saturday, October 4-5, 2024:

Shearing:

Open final (12 sheep): Chris Vickers (Palmerston) 21m 47.07s, 90.3535pts, 1; James Fagan (Te Kuiti) 21m 40.68s, 94.034pts, 2; Dion Morrell (Alexandra) 22m 2.09s, 96.8545pts, 3; Nathan Stratford (Invercargill) 25m 4.35s, 100.4675pts,45; Sam Mackrill (Shepparton, Vic.) 23m 4.22s, 104.8776pts, 5; Grant Smith (Rakaia) 25m 30.49s, 110.7745pts, 6.

Senior final (4 sheep): Danielle Mauger (Boyup Brook, W.A.) 12m 22.62s, 59.881pts, 1; Taelor Tarrant 11m 39.53s, 62.2265pts, 2; Shaun Goosen (Phillippolis,, South Africa) 12m 58.63s, 67.1815pts, 3; Aiden Tarrant 11m 16.97s, 67.5985pts, 4; Tawhaarangi Taylor (Murupara) 14m 4.57s, 68.9785pts, 5; Dre Roberts (Mataura) 14m 4.56s, 69.478pts, 6.

Woolhandling:

Open final: Pagan Rimene (Alexandra) 129.032pts, 1; Foonie Waihape (Alexandra) 178.976pts, 2; Monica Potae (Kennedy Bay) 188.306pts, 3; Joel Henare (Gisborne/Motueka) 199.85pts, 4.

Senior final: Autumn Waihape (Mataura) 144.542pts, 1; Lucy Elers (Mataura) 152.326pts, 2; Stoneigh Waihape (Mataura) 172.956pts, 3; Lucy Gee Taylor (Alexandra) 187.712pts, 4.

Junior final: Miria Hohepa (Napier) 167.182prs, 1; Misty Rose Kokiri Elers (Mataura) 179.09pts, 2; Capree Wallace (Taihape) 272.268pts, 3; Grace Croasdale (Masterton) 276.188pts, 4.

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