Representative bowls resumes on Friday when Revital Fertilisers Taranaki contests the central region Octagonal event in Kapiti.
The three-day tournament, over seven rounds, will give men’s selector Allan Batley and his women’s counterpart Janice Ropitini the last chance to try combinations ahead of the national competition next month.
The Octagonal, which was reborn in New Plymouth in fine style last February, features the eight centres in the North Island from Taranaki across to Gisborne/East Coast and south to Wellington.
A feature of the event will be the ability of the selectors to change players between disciplines each round.
Batley has initially picked Darren Goodin as the men’s singles player, while a new pairs combination of Hamish Kape and Stefan McCartain will be tried.
Dean Elgar starts off skipping a four of Daryl Read, Aidan Zittersteijn and Gerry O’Sullivan.
The triples team is John Garrud, Steve Walker and Craig De Faria. That trio, along with Elgar, Neil Candy, John Roberts and an impressive Bruce Colgan, recently took out the Paul and Sharon Spiers-sponsored Taranaki men’s division one interclub title.
In the playoffs on their home green, West End finished with 14 points, ahead of two-time defending champion Paritutu and Hawera Park (both 9) and Oakura (4).
Ropiniti has selected Chris Commane initially in the singles. Commane won the champion-of-champions title in October and was last month runner-up to Rhonda Adams in the open singles.
Anne Duggan has been added to the squad and will lead for Jackie Moeahu in the pairs, while the starting triples team is Ella Smailes, Anne Potaka and skip Robyn Klenner.
Trish Howard heads the four of Anne Brophy, Susan Cottam and Adams.
On Saturday and Sunday the under-eights representative teams contest a hexagonal event in Palmerston North.
The women’s team is Briar Atkinson, Norma Jane, Rita Davey, Shelley Clark, Tina Quilter, Francis Busby, Ma Arapo, Amanda Crehan, Cheryll Sharrock and Hazel Schwartfeger.
The men’s side is Evan Jones, Bruce Colgan, Kelly Hill, Laurence Hori, Steve Sabine, Corey Brookes, Steve Temperton, Ryan Vincent, Kurt Smith and Bruce Lilley.
Meanwhile, a number of extended tournaments are set to take place over the coming weeks. One of the first to occur was the West End men’s over 60s, which was finalised on Wednesday. Sponsored by Vospers, the three-day event was won by one of the most clubbable of all bowlers, Frank Klenner. Klenner skipped his Inglewood team of Murray Dalton and Neil Earley to first place.
Oakura’s Wayne Robinson was second, ahead of West End’s Paul Darbyshire and rugby enthusiast Kevin Gledhill (Paritutu). John Garrud (West End) took out the second division.