Palumbo, Grooby remain unbeaten
Stoke’s Domenic Palumbo and Diane Grooby remained unbeaten to win the Nelson champion of champions pairs indoor bowls events.
Seven club champions from around the Nelson district met to play on a two life system at the Bowls Stadium in Stoke on Wednesday.
Earlier, Palumbo won a tight tussle with Hope’s Colleen Puklowski and Lorraine Clelland, sneaking home 8-6 after going into the last end down 6-5. He then met the Hope team again in the semifinal. Another arm wrestle followed with Palumbo leading 9-8 going into the last end where he scored a three to win 12-8.
This left Palumbo and Grooby with both lives intact going into the final where they met the Star Club team of Russell Moore and Leona Ellis, who had one life after a 17-3 loss to Stoke. With the Star team needing to beat the Stoke pair twice to win the title, Palumbo and Grooby controlled the final for a comfortable 10-2 win.
Wakapuaka’s Johnny Persico, Fred Persico and Shirley Deerness have won the Nelson champion of champions triples title for the second straight year after beating Stoke’s Mike Johnston, Kaleb Johnston and Diane Grooby in Sunday’s final.
Persico beat Hope’s Colleen Puklowski, Lorraine Clelland and Richard Newport 14-4 in the semifinals to make the final with one life. Johnston’s team played well to make the final unbeaten with both lives intact after earlier beating Persico 8-3, meaning that Wakapuaka had to beat Stoke twice to win the title.
The first final was tight over 10 ends with Persico up 9-7 going into the last end, where he scored a single to win 10-7. With both teams down to one life, Persico’s team controlled the second match to win comfortably 13-5.
Meanwhile, Jim and Linda Carrick won Saturday’s Honest Lawyer husband and wife pairs by one point from Brian and Kay Fletcher. Wins were tied at the end of the day requiring a countback on points which the Carrick’s won with 28 points to the Fletchers’ 27. Christine East and Tony Hodgson beat Mary Stewart and Dale Burrell 13-3 in the mixed pairs final.
Jean McKenzie and her team of Clive Johnston, Kevin McKenzie and Phil Jordan won all four games to win the Club Waimea open fours on Friday. Graham Webb, Bev Boucher, Mary Stewart and Lou Benbrook were second with three wins after a count-back of points.
This week, the Marlborough open pairs will be played on Saturday at 10am and the fours on Sunday at 9am, both at the Simcox Stadium in Blenheim.
The New Zealand under-18 national junior singles are being played on Saturday and the New Zealand national secondary schools singles on Sunday, both in North Wellington.
Kaleb Johnston, 16, is representing both Nelson in the Junior singles and Waimea College in the secondary schools singles. He placed third equal the last two years in the national junior singles, represented the Southern Zone juniors for the last two years and holds a Nelson Centre gold star.