Cousins' women's shearing record bid all-go near Gore
“No question...The record will go.”
The green light has been given for the summer’s first shearing record attempt in New Zealand in Eastern Southland today (Friday) – with the record holders on hand to cheer on their challengers.
Starting at 7am, cousins Megan Whitehead and Hannah McColl are attempting the Women’s World two-stands eight-hours record for strongwool lambs, at Grant Brothers Tin House, 759 Otapiri-Mandeville Road, near Gore.
On hand will be Hawke’s Bay mother-and-daughter Marg Baynes and Ingrid Smith (nee Baynes) who have held the record of 903 for almost 15 years, since their big day in a King Country woolshed on January 13, 2009, when mum did 433 and daughter did what was also the solo record of 470.
The current solo record of 601, shorn by King Country-based Sacha Bond in Northern Southland last February, will also be at stake.
World Sheep Shearing Records Society secretary Hugh McCarroll MNZM, of Tauranga, said the first hurdle was achieved when 18.02kg of wool was shorn from 20 lambs in a sample shear late on Thursday afternoon - just 0.02kg more than the minimum requirement.
The lambs, which he said are a “good line” of romneys, were required to average 0.9kg a lamb for the record attempt to go ahead, and the threshold was met at the first of what could have been up to four attempts.
Marg Baynes, down from Wairoa in Northern Hawke’s Bay and a visitor to the woolshed on Thursday, expects that by the finish at 5pm, she and her daughter, wife of champion and record-breaking shearer Rowland Smith, will no longer be the record-holders.
“No question,” she said. “The record will go.”
“We’re glad to be here to see these strong, fit and capable young women pursuing their dream,” she said.
Prepared to help out in any way possible, she thinks she’ll be able to simply sit and watch throughout.
“I don't think we will have a job, it all looks very organised,” she said. “Wiped a few dusty plastic seats off and helped set them up today. It will be an amazing day with impressive tallies, I believe.”
Whitehead already has the solo and four-stand nine-hours records to her name, but it will be the first record attempt for McColl.
The record bid, overseen by a panel of five judges, tasked with ensuring quality standards are maintained ad the rules followed, will comprise four runs of two-hours each, with half-hour breaks for morning and afternoon “smoko” and an hour for lunch.
Conditions were on the improve from rain and cool temperatures in the region on Wednesday to a forecast maximum of 24deg on Friday.