World Bowls debut for Inch, coach
Meet the Blackjacks
Young Blackjack Katelyn Inch’s new coach predicted last year that she ‘‘wasn’t far away’’ from her New Zealand bowls debut.
Now the 21-year-old university student is set to play at her first world championships alongside her personal coach, Mike Kernaghan, 61.
Inch had just started bowling at Oxford in North Canterbury in 2008 when the last World Bowls championships were held in Christchurch.
She was only seven when teammate Jo Edwards won her first Commonwealth Games gold medal in 2002.
Inch is ‘‘pretty excited’’ at the prospect of playing in the World Bowls tournament, which starts on Tuesday in Christchurch.,
‘‘I was nervous a few weeks ago, but now we’ve got into the training and we’re in camp, it’s pretty exciting. I can’t wait for it to start.’’
Inch, who is also a talented netballer, followed her father and grandfather onto the bowling greens eight years ago as a 12-yearold. Her early start has become a family trend. Her 10-year-old brother, Jacob, has taken up bowls too and ‘‘is loving it’’. ‘‘He’s always asking me to go out and play with him.’’
Inch said she ‘‘didn’t even know there was a world bowls championship’’ when she first started playing. But she’s proved a quick learner, winning the New Zealand secondary schools title in 20134 and collecting bronze and silver medals at national championships.
Inch, who will play in the triples and the fours, was also part of Canterbury’s national intercentre gold medal winning team in 2015. She remains a proud Oxford club member but has also joined the Canterbury club in central Christchurch while attending the University of Canterbury where she has just completed the third year of a Bachelor of Sports Coaching degree.
‘‘I’m flatting in town and it just makes it easier to train and also partly because there aren’t many women at Oxford so there’s now a lot of competition.’’
Inch and her friend Tayla Bruce, who has also played for the Blackjacks, ventured down to Dunedin last year to seek some coaching tips from Kernaghan.
’’He helped us out a bit, he knew what he was talking about, so I asked him to be my personal coach.’’
Kernaghan felt then that his young charge was on the brink of the Blackjacks and his prophesy was fulfilled when she made her debut at the Asia Pacific championships in Christchurch last December where she helped New Zealand get bronze medals in the triples and fours.
Inch, who had represented New Zealand at under-18 and under-25 level, won gold with the Blackjacks four at the 2016 Six Nations tournament. She said the triples and
fours were ‘‘starting to gel as a team’’ and ‘‘everyone gets on really well’’.
The teams have had a change of skip with Mandy Bruce pulling out and former singles star Val Smith taking over. But Inch said Smith had ‘‘close to 500 caps’’ and there was ‘‘no confidence loss whatsoever’’.
Any apprehensions Inch had about playing on the game’s biggest stage were eased when she ‘‘got the opportunity to play in the BPL [Bowls Premier League] in Australia’’ last month.
‘‘That gave me a bit of confidence, playing with two of the guys [Shannon Mcilroy and Ali Forsyth] from the team here.’’
SITI ZALINA AHMAD (MALAYSIA)
The 36-year-old is the only woman to have won two Commonwealth Games gold medals (2002 and 2006). A regular visitor to New Zealand, she won the world championships singles crown the last time the tournament was held in Christchurch in 2008.
KAREN MURPHY (AUSTRALIA)
Sydneysider Murphy, 42, was the undoubted star of the 2012 world championships, winning singles and triples gold medals in Adelaide. A respected rival of Kiwi star Jo Edwards, Murphy has been at the top for 20 years and has four Commonwealth Games medals, including a pairs gold in Melbourne in 2006.
KELSEY COTTRELL (AUSTRALIA)
MEN SHANNON MCILROY The 29-year-old Nelsonian is the Blackjacks’ singles specialist and pairs skip. A singles bronze medallist at the World Bowls in 2012, Mcilroy’s stated goal is to become a world champion. He’s well on the way after winning the NZ title and the Six Nations singles gold medal in 2016. MIKE KERNAGHAN A New Zealand Olympic Committee selector, Kernaghan, 61, first played international bowls 25 years ago, but these are his first world champs. Dunedin’s 2002 Commonwealth Games singles bronze medallist will lead in the pairs and play No 2 in the fours. ALI FORSYTH Another Nelson bowls product, who has two World Bowls bronze medals to his credit (2008 singles and 2012 triples. Now based in Melbourne, Forsyth, 36, will skip the Blackjacks’ triples and four teams. Won seven NZ titles, including the 2016 singles crown with his father, Neville. MIKE NAGY The former Birkenhead bowler’s game has advanced since switching to the Taren Point club in Sydney. Nagy, 36, made his Blackjacks debut in the 2015 trans-tasman series and has already won two Asia Pacific Championship gold medals in the triples and fours in 2015 and a fours gold and a pairs silver at the Six Nations tournament last March. BLAKE SIGNAL The Stokes Valley product, 34, now plays in Australia at Nelson Bay, NSW. A three-time New Zealand titleholder, Signal was part of the Blackjacks’ winning four at the 2016 Six Nations series and picked up a silver in the triples. WOMEN JO EDWARDS A two-time Commonwealth Games champion in the pairs (2002) and singles (2014), Edwards, 46, is set to become ‘‘our most successful player in our history, man or woman’’, says nationalcoach elect Sharon Sims, who won the pairs gold with Edwards at the 2002 Games in Manchester and the 2004 world championships. Edwards won the World Bowls pairs title with best friend Val Smith in Christchurch in 2008. ANGELA BOYD A Hawke’s Bay stalwart now settled in Christchurch, Boyd is attending her first world championship, but has two national pairs and two national fours titles under her belt. The 30-year-old loves to lead and will perform that vital role in the pairs and the fours. VAL SMITH Once a singles specialist who won the world title in 2008 and was silver medallist in 2012, Smith now has new responsibilities as skip of the New Zealand triples and fours teams. A Commonwealth Games silver medallist in the singles in 2010 and a bronze medallist in the fours in 2014. KIRSTEN EDWARDS It was inevitable Edwards would end up on a bowls rink – her mother Leigh Griffin is a former national singles champion. The 25-year-old Wellingtonian is now based in Nelson and made her NZ debut in the 2016 Trans Tasman Series. KATELYN INCH The youngest Blackjack at 21, Inch hails from the North Canterbury township of Oxford. The University of Canterbury student first played for the Blackjacks at the 2015 Asia Pacifics and won a fours gold medal in the 2016 Trans Tasman series.