Australian Supreme Championships.

Supreme Championship Arena trial Dowerin WA

The Supreme this year was held in WA in the Wheatlbelt town of Dowerin, 160 km North East of Perth.

Dowerin is a small town with a huge community spirit.

Every year in August Dowerin hosts the largest machinery field day in WA. The whole town is involved and this hospitality was extended to the trialling community as well.

The trial commenced on Mon the 12th of September with the novice event on a separate ground. The sheep for this event were very workable and there were a number of high scores.

The winner after a run off, was Geoff Gibson with Gibson’s Smokey. Geoff was the most successful trialler of the week, also winning the supreme event and topping the individual placings in the interstate challenge.

On Tue the first round of the Ted Gaby Memorial Challenge commenced. Once again there were some high score and exciting trialling.

After this event the Supreme commenced, and the novice event finished up on ring two.

The next two rounds of the Ted Gaby were run on Thursday and Friday, with the official opening and welcome held before the second round, were competitors in the Interstate Challenge dressed in their best for the occasion.

In the early part of the week the sheep in the main arena were quite workable and there were many pens. The weather was fairly warm, in fact conditions became quite summery. By the thursday however a strong wind had sprung up and the sheep became more difficult. The bridge proved the hoodoo obstacle with many competitors either retiring here or running out of time.

The warm weather vanished on Sunday and was replaced by cold bucketing rain which caused everyone to hunt for wet weather gear and move equipment off the ground as water raced through the camping area. The supreme finals were run during the rain, but it cleared an hour or two later to occasional showers.

All events wound up about 1pm followed by presentations and everyone began packing vans and cars and moving on.

Many of the interstate competitors will continue on to the Esperance trial, which is the state open event for West Aussies, before beginning the long drive home.

It was a very successful event, and organisers, helpers and the town of Dowerin are to be congratulated.

Novice.

Judge Ken Atherton.

1st G Gibson. Gibson’s Smokey. 145

2nd Rod Forsyth. Binnaburra Wal. Kelpie. 139

3rd Frank Sutherland. Rocky Judy. 135

4th Jim O’Connell. Camara Hooker. 132

5th Geoff Gibson. Blackbrook Donovon.123

6th Marianne Rogers. Christies Coco. 121.

7th Peter Gorman. Badgingarra Nell. 91

Improver.

Judged by Wayne Hall and Ian Beard.