January 25, 2022
Omicron clips shearing sports
Shearing Sports New Zealand is reassessing how it can run competitions under the new traffic light restrictions.
Almost half the scheduled competitions have been cancelled, and spokesperson Doug Laing says events last weekend at Tapawera, just south of Nelson, and Levin could be the last A & P shows or shearing sports competitions open to the general public this summer.
Attendance at next Sunday’s Agrodome Shears shearing and woolhandling championships at Ngongotaha Showgrounds will be limited to “bubbles” of no more than 100 people and admission only to vaccine pass holders.
“Most shows will be considering what form of show can happen. If they do go ahead they will be on a very curtailed basis, as at Te Kuiti – possibly too early to know if they will call it off yet, it’s not until April, but it’s anybody’s guess what will happen,” Mr Laing says.
Highlights of the weekend competition included the efforts of Horowhenua A & P, and I Show shears title winner David Gordon from Masterton, who has now won in all five shearing grades in New Zealand, and Taumarunui’s Te Anna Phillips, a former Golden Shears Junior woolhandling champion, who won the senior woolhandling title, just beating the self-described Scots Māori Emily Te Kapa.