Rich Corry, Tim Toomey and Ray Martin continued their good form by winning their way through the Regional ‘Pathways’ play-offs at the Paritutu club in New Plymouth on Thursday to qualify for the NZ National Club Champ Triples finals in Invercargill in June. They started the day with a tense 17-17 draw against the Taranaki champions from the West End club, then beat the Paraparaumu Beach triple from Kapiti Coast 19-9 in the second game to put themselves in a good position to qualify. The Wanganui champions did not turn up in New Plymouth, so our triple sat out the last game hoping the Kapiti Coast side would keep their match with Taranaki close – which they did, and in fact beat the locals ensuring a visit for our boys to the Waverley Bowling Club’s indoor stadium in June.
Our Women’s Open Triples champions Nina De Munnik and Helen King were joined in New Plymouth by sub Kirsten Griffin as Lisa White was unavailable due to work commitments. They came up against a red-hot Taranaki team from Hawera Park in the first round going down 17-26, before comfortably disposing of Paraparaumu Beach 26-8 in the second. Three teams still had a good chance going into the last round, but unfortunately our women went down to the eventual qualifiers from Wanganui East 12-19.