World shearing record for Sacha

KING Country shearer Sacha Bond has become the first woman to shear more than 700 sheep in nine hours.

The 30-year-old Piopio mum made her bid for the solo nine-hour strong wool lamb shearing record at Centre Hill near Mossburn in Northern Southland on Tuesday.

Sacha’s total after nine hours was 720, smashing the previous record of 661 set by Southland shearer Megan Whitehead two years ago.

The official tally comprised 162 sheep in the first two hours to breakfast, and successive 1hr 45min runs of 142, 137, 137 and 142 around the half-hour breaks for morning and afternoon tea and one hour for lunch.

Highlighting her endurance and fitness, Sacha was as agile at the end as she was at the beginning, even marginally quicker, Doug Laing from Shearing Sports said.

Her employer, Piopio shearing contractor Mark Barrowcliffe, said Sacha had worked with his shearing crew since her return from Australia in late November.

“We are just extremely proud of her because we know the dedication she puts into training every morning and night and working hard during the day, and just the mental focus and fortitude it needs to achieve what she has achieved,” he said.

“She didn’t just break that record she smashed it … I can’t take any credit for training or anything like that, I just flog her arse each day; day in, day out.”

Since returning from Australia late last month, Sacha has worked every day shearing lambs around the King Country before travelling south to have a couple of days for the record attempt.

They have been getting her used to New Zealand lambs again after shearing in Australia for a few months.

Their working shearers, woolhandlers and pressers bounce between the North Island, South Island and Australia.“We’ve got about 20 shearers, about 40 staff,” Mark said.

“Everyone in our crew is either a shearer, woolhandler or presser. There’s no ground given just because you are a lady or a bloke. That’s your job.

“We’ve tried to give her a higher percentage of lambs in the build up to her record, so she was shearing lambs every day to get her pattern down pat and just get used to the sheer speed of lambs and the workload.”

Sacha was also hitting the gym every morning or every night and then shearing all day, he said.

On February 9, Sacha will attempt the ewe record of 452, in a bid to become the first female to hold the record for nine hours on both lambs and ewes.

“It’s very hard to do, even David (Fagan) tried to do that back in the day when he was quite dominant – to do two records in one stint,” Mark said. “For one reason or another it didn’t happen for him either. It’s not an easy feat.

“I think she’s had to train a lot of her strength and getting preparation for the ewe record in February, and then switch her training to flexibility for the lamb record – and then she’s got to bounce back again into the core strength one again in preparation for the ewes. There’s a fair bit involved in her training.”

He said women shearers in New Zealand and Australia were quite  strong at the moment, and there were several who could probably match Sacha – but whether they wanted to put their head on the block was the question.

“Even registering for a record, I think is about $US5000 and everything else that goes with it. So, you pay a lot of money to try and kill yourself for one day.

“She’s gone down in history now as the first woman to beat 700. That record will be broken at some point, but being the first one over that line, well, that will never change.”

Shearing Sports NZ chair Sir David Fagan said it was absolutely incredible what Sacha and Megan Whitehead had achieved.

“They have taken women’s shearing to another level.

“A lot of people would say they’d never have thought that sort of tally would be done,” he said.

“They are both good friends. The camaraderie of New Zealand shearing in general was on show yesterday when you see Megan Whitehead helping Sacha Bond break her own record. It’s great to see.

“Absolutely incredible, absolutely amazing. I think what is exciting is what we may see from both of them in the future in the next couple of years. We will see some big things out of them in the next couple of years for sure.”