Woolly run secured for Feilding until 2020
Seeing 1000 sheep making a 500-metre dash through the main street of Feilding will be a familiar sight for three more years.
The Running of the Wools made its Feilding debut this year when The Hilux Rural Games shifted to Manawatu¯ for the first time in the event’s history.
A flock of sheep from Potaka Station are set to return to Manchester Square for the annual event on March 9 after Property Brokers won naming rights on Monday.
The sheep are herded through the streets following a man and mutt race, and a wool baling competition.
Manawatu¯ mayor Helen Worboys said the event celebrated New Zealand’s rich rural history – offering urban residents and tourists a chance to experience rural life up-close and personal.
‘‘It’s another celebration of who we are, a rural hub for the wider Central North Island,’’ she said.
‘‘We’re home to the largest sale yards in the Southern Hemisphere right in the heart of our town, many successful and progressive agriculture based businesses, the award-winning Feilding Farmers Market, which will be running on the day of the event, and the birthplace of the rural cartoonist, the late Murray Ball.’’
Hilux New Zealand Rural Games founder and trustee Steve Hollander said the event had expanded to include the Transtasman Fit4farming cycling race that would attract about 60 competitors.