The Country, NZ Herald

Toa Henderson is shaping up as a serious contender to end Rowland Smith’s Golden Shears open championship-winning run this week in Masterton.

Henderson, of Kaiwaka, won a six-man Pahiatua Shears open final, scoring his third victory in three weeks over Hawke’s Bay-based Smith.

The 50th Anniversary Pahiatua Shears took place at Fouhy Family Farm, on Mangaone Valley Rd, Pahiatua, on Sunday, February 26, 2023.

Henderson, (32), blasted through the 20 second-shear sheep in 15min 58.66sec and held on to the quality to beat runner-up Smith by 0.695pts.

Henderson has never shorn in a Golden Shears open final but has now won seven finals in the 2022-2023 season.

His previous wins over Smith include beating him by half a point at the Atia Sports Shears open final on Waitangi Day and winning the Otago Shears final five days later, where Smith came fourth.

Henderson won Friday’s Taumarunui Shears open final as well, with 2012 World Champion Gavin Mutch, from Scotland but farming in Hawke’s Bay, coming in second.

Third place went to Otorohanga’s Digger Balme, after a remarkable effort backing up from a recent win at Te Puke - still making it in his 37th season of open-class shearing.

Smith couldn’t attend this event as he, along with fellow multiple Golden Shears open winner and former World Champion John Kirkpatrick, were both working on Cyclone Gabrielle damage to their respective properties near Hastings.

It didn’t all go Henderson’s way, however, as Smith beat him in the Apiti Sports Shears final on Saturday.

Meanwhile, Kirkpatrick put in a startling effort for third the next day at Pahiatua.

King Country shearer Clay Harris continued a winning season with victories in the Taumarunui and Apiti senior finals but missed a place in the top six for the Pahiatua senior final, which was won by Adam Gordon, of Masterton.

The intermediate wins were shared by Taelor Tarrant, winning at his home Taumarunui show, young England shearer Callum Bosley claiming the Apiti title and Balclutha’s Will Sinclair triumphing at the Pahiatua Shears.

The junior titles were also sheared, with Jake Goldsbury, of Waitotara, winning at Taumarunui, and Northern Southland shearers Cody Waihape and Emma Martin at Apiti and Pahiatua respectively.

The Taumarunui novice final was won by local Maaka Power, with the Apiti and Pahiatua finals both won by Taihape’s Trent Alabaster, now following in the footsteps of brother Reuben, a successful competitor through the grades and who in December set a world lamb shearing record.

Meanwhile, champion woolhandler Joel Henare is on target to claim a possibly unprecedented clean sweep of major late-summer titles, as he prepares for a bid to win a ninth consecutive Golden Shears open title.

Henare won the Otago Shears’ New Zealand Woolhandler of the Year title for the 13th time on February 11, followed it a week later with victory in the Southern Shears open final, and continued in his winning way at the Taumarunui Shears and the Apiti Shears.

He now faces the Wairarapa Pre-Shears on Wednesday at Riverside Farm, Mikimiki, before heading the 12km south to Masterton where the Golden Shears will be held on Thursday-Saturday, the event bouncing back from two years of cancellations due to Covid-19 restrictions.

Henare will be a warm favourite to win the Golden Shears final, as he heads into the event with nine wins behind him this season and a career tally of 132 open final wins since his first in 2006.

Henare has, however, ruled himself out of a bid for a third world-individual title, and is not contesting a selection series which ends this week, with the naming of two woolhandlers in the Wools of New Zealand Shearing Sports New Zealand team for the 2023 World Championships in Edinburgh in June.

At the Taumarunui Shears, he won by less than two points from former New Zealand Shears open winner and now-only-occasional competitor Hanatia Tipene, of Te Kuiti, with third place going to leading selection-series competitor Chelsea Collier.

The following day Henare, from Gisborne but now living in Motuekas, had a comfortable win at Apiri, where second place went to 2010 World Teams Champion and former New Zealand teammate Keryn Herbert, who will this year represent Cook Islands at the World Championships.

Third and fourth placings went to Eketahuna sisters Emaraina Eruera and Marika Braddick.

Taumarunui sisters Vinniye and Te Anna Phillips dominated the weekend’s senior finals, first and second respectively at their home show on Friday and reversed the result 24 hours later at Apiti.

In the junior events, there was a home-show first win for Renee Tarrant, of Taumarunui, while at Apiti Tatijana Keefe, from Raupunga, scored her third win of the season.

The keenness for competing was highlighted at all three-weekend competitions, in particular at the Apiti Shears, which had been threatened with cancellation because of repeated rain in the previous week.

It stopped just long enough for the sheep to dry and be shedded up on Friday. It was back on Saturday but didn’t deter the 219 competitors, comprising 157 shearers and 62 woolhandlers.

There were 122 competitors at the shearing-only Pahiatua Shears.

Meanwhile, the only weekend South Island event, the Kaikoura A and P Show shears, had one of its best entries in recent years, with 28 shearers competing across four grades.

Travers Baigent, from Wakefield, won the open final, after winning at Murchison a week earlier, and the senior final was won by James Wilson, of Winton.

The intermediate final provided a first win for Ike Nitsche, from Feilding, and Rangiora shearer Lydia Thomson had her ninth win of the season in the junior final, en route to her first North Island assignment the next day, when she was fourth at the Pahiatua Shears.

Results of the 50th Anniversary Pahiatua Shears at Fouhy Family Farm, Mangaone Valley Rd, Pahiatua, on Sunday, February 26, 2023

Open final (20 sheep): Toa Henderson (Kaiwaka) 15min 58.66sec, 56.483pts, 1; Rowland Smith (Maraekakaho) 16min 30.56sec, 57.178pts, 2; Gavin Mutch (Scotland/Dannevirke) 16min 2.73sec, 59.987pts, 3; John Kirkpatrick (Pakipaki) 17min 53.02sec, 60.501pts, 4; Nathan Stratford (Invercargill) 18min 2.69sec, 61.235pts, 5; Aaron Haynes (Feilding) 18min 20.7sec, 62.435pts, 6.