Masterton woolhandler Cushla Abraham brought both form and a major surprise to Central Otago town Alexandra as she won the New Zealand Merino Championships Open woolhandling title.

The dominating performance, spearheaded by exceptional fleece quality points in the final, won her a place in the New Zealand team for the post-Covid resumption of transtasman tests in Bendigo, Vic., on October 21.

The black shirt marks a unique double, emulating husband and shearing contracting business partner Paerata Abraham who shore in the last two pre-Covid tests after winning the 2019 PGG Wrightson National Shearing Circuit.

It was a determined and consummate triumph from the 33-year-old mum-of-two who had undergone weight-loss surgery to shed 44kg in the last year and overcome diabetes, issues that had started to control her life since the birth of her first child 10 years ago, and was quite happy to talk about it.

“It’s changed my life,” she said the morning after the win as the couple prepared to fly home to Masterton to see the children they hadn’t seen for two months while “down south” working, mainly on merinos, for Alexandra contractors Peter and Elsie Lyon.

“I’m fitter now than I was when I was 20,” she said.

Thus, Abraham dominated throughout to be top qualifier among the 27 woolhandlers in the heats on Friday and repeated the form through the semifinals to Saturday’s final, in which she beat the only three other competitors to have won the Shearing Sports New Zealand season’s opening major title in the last decade.

The runner-up was four-times winner and 2019 World teams champion Pagan Rimene, of Alexandra, third was 2013 winner Amy Ferguson, of Alexandra, and fourth was four-times winner, 2012 and 2017 World champion and Gisborne woolhandler Joel Henare, to whom she had been runner-up, while pregnant with her first child, in her first season of Open woolhandling in 2012.

She hadn’t reached an Alexandra final since, and she’d had just two Open-class wins, at the Rangitikei Shearing Sports in Marton in February 2015 and at her home Wairarapa A and P Show at Clareville, Carterton, in October 2016, since when she’d contested just four finals despite being at almost every competition, also live-streaming events with family operation Shedtalk.

It was as a shearer that Abraham, in pre-married days as Cushla Gordon, first came to light, as winner of the Golden Shears Novice shearing final in 2008, a title also won by brothers David (in 2010) and Adam (2019), while third brother Joseph has also been a multiple winner in the lower shearing grades.

She and Paerata will be back in the South Island later in the week for the Waimate Spring Shears on Friday and Saturday, and they expect to both me in Australia – with Paerata in support, just as she was when he was in the team three years ago.

For Cushla it will be the start of a chase for the ultimate goal this season, to win a place in the New Zealand team for the 2023 World Championships in Scotland.

Meanwhile it was also a big day on Saturday for record-breaking shearer Stacey Te Huia, from the North Island but based in Central Otago now for five years, partly to realise the dream of New Zealand transtasman team selection, which he finally achieved as best Kiwi in the Shears’ Open shearing final.

He was runner-up to Australian champion Daniel McIntyre, from northeastern New South Wales town Glen Innes and who reasserted the Australian dominance of New Zealand’s top finewool merino-shearing event established by West Australia gun Damien Boyle in eight wins in the decade from 2010 to 2019.

Third was three-times winner Nathan Stratford and fourth was Leon Samuels, the Invercargill shearers with whom Te Huia is expected to compete in the test in Australia later this month, and the return match at the Golden Shears in Masterton on March 4.

Te Huia, now 44, has set shearing records on both sides of the Tasman, most notably the eight-hours solo strongwool record of 603 he shore at Mangapehi, near Bennydale, in 2010, and the still-standing two-stand, nine-hours strongwool ewes record of 1341 he shore two years later with Waikaretu shearer Sam Welch, at Te Hape, also near Bennydale, and nine-hours merino ewes tally of 530 he shore near Dubbo, NSW, in February 2015..

But despite those heights he thought he wasn’t handling the pressure of the few competition finals he’d reached, and made the strategic step of switching contractors for part of the season so that he could learn more from Hawke’s Bay shearer Ariki Hawkins, working for Stringer Shearing, of Ranfurly.

McIntyre also spearheaded a team from Australia’s REDI-e First Nation Australia contingent, mainly the trainers, to a shearing and woolhandling win over a NZ Merino Shears team, comprising top qualifiers from the Open and Senior grades.

Russell Ratima, from Aria and having established his merinos creds with a win in the New Zealand Winter Comb Senior final in Waimate last year, won Saturday’s Senior shearing final by just 0.25pts from Mitchell Menzies, of Ranfurly.

The Senior woolhandling final was won by Tamara Marshall, of Waikaretu, and the Junior final was won by Shakira Matenga, from North Otago.

About 150 competitors took part, more than 20 up on last year’s 60th anniversary celebration, and society president Lane McSkimming said was noticeable that the championships had attracted a lot more from outside the shearing industry and from the wider community level than in recent years.

The Waimate Spring Shears, with crossbred fullwool and finewool winter comb titles at stake, are on Friday next weekend, before competitors, particularly the woolhandlers, head north for the first North Island shearing and woolhandling championships of the season at the Poverty Bay A and P Shows on October 15 and the Hawke’s Bay show’s Great Raihania Shears six days latere.

Results from the New Zealand Merino Shears shearing and woolhandling championships at Alexandra on Friday-Saturday September 30-October 1:

Shearing:

Open final (12 sheep): Daniel McIntyre (Glen Innes, NSW) 23min 32sec, 81.0167pts, 1; Stacey Te Huia (Alexandra) 22min 44.81sec, 90.0738pts, 2; Nathan Stratford (Alexandra) 24min 30.12sec, 90.0893pts, 3; Leon Samuels (Alexandra) 22min 31.63sec, 90.1648pts, 4; Angus Moore (Seddon) 23min 10.31sec, 92.2655pts, 5; Paul Robertson (West Australia) 26min 19.46sec, 108.1397pts, 6.

Senior final (4 sheep): Russell Ratima (Aria) 10min 26.02sec, 60.803pts, 1; Mitchell Menzies (Ranfurly) 14min 51.56sec, 60.828pts, 2; Scott Cameron (Alexandra) 14min 52.34sec, 62.867pts, 3; Josh Quinn (Seddon) 13min 9.29sec, 74.4645pts, 4; Cole Wells (Tarras) 13min 19.91sec, 76.9955pts, 5; Kevan Stringer (Ranfurly) 14min 41.1sec, 90.805pts, 6.

Woolhandling:

Open: Cushla Abraham (Masterton) 122.458pts, 1; Pagan Rimene (Alexandra) 162.38pts, 2; Amy Ferguson (Invercargill) 192.832pts, 3; Joel Henare (Gisborne) 228.694pts, 4.

Senior: Tamara Marshall (Waekaretu) 127.156pts, 1; Ripeka Ferris 164.688pts, 2; Amberlee Kahukura (Mataura) 240.368pts, 3; Jess Toa (Ashburton) 249.7pts, 4.

Junior: Shakira Matenga (North Otago) 184.744pts, 1; Jamie Penfold (-) 190.726pts, 2; Emma Martin (Gore) 200.7pts, 3; Tia Manson Piopio) 204.82pts, 4.

Shearing and woolhandling:

Transtasman (four sheep): REDI-e First Nation Indigenous Australia (Daniel McIntyre, Dom White, Angela Wakely, Kristal Weatherall) 10min 8.13sec, 281.813pts, beat NZ Merino Shears (Angus Moore, Scott Cameron, Cushla Abraham, Tamara Marshall) 10min 4.16sec, 352.216pts.

NZ Merino Shears Teams: The Shilly Team 9min 57.06sec, 248.106pts, 1; Team Peter Lyon 10min 25.06sec, 281.906pts, 2; Yeah Nah 10min 26.97sec, 337.497pts, 3.

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