N.Z. Ploughman Led In Stubble Work

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31676, 11 May 1968, Page 9

N.Z. Ploughman Led In Stubble Work

New Zealand’s representative in the 1968 world ploughing contest, 34yearaold lan B. Blair, put up a fantastic performance and was unlucky not to

have won. At the end of the first day he was in the lead three points ahead of his nearest rival, West Germany. On ' the second and final day he experienced trouble, and lost his < lead. He ended up in 1 sixth place, behind , Dutch, German and i British competitors. ] In spite of unctions ana I the high cost of petrol and transport, more than 32,000 Rhodesian; from ail parts of the country and several thousand visitors from abroad made their way to the ploughing site at Kent Estate, a model farm in lovely sur- < roundings some 35 miles south-west of Salisbury, to . watch the contest The gruelling twtyday event, ! in which 18 competitors from J 10 countries matched their ’ skill and stamina, was won by 1 the Netherlands, with West Germany the runner-up. Third place was shared by West Germany and Great Britain. Fifth place was also taken by Britain, and New Zealand finished sixth.

The huge crowds, many of whom were unable to appreciate the finer points of ploughing, were seized by the atmosphere of an international contest, and the ploughmen were enthusiastically cheered on completion of their furrows.

The weather was perfect for the spectators but the rains a few days before hampered the ploughmen and they had trouble with mud sticking to their ploughs, necessitating frequent stopping and scraping. The competitors themselves were in good spirits and the tension cat the first day, which had been building up all morning, brake when the racket to start the ploughing was fired by the wife of the officer administering the Rhodesian Government, Mrs

Clifford Dupont, at noon. Ploughing stopped 20 minutes later when the “opening splits” had been completed. The judges then examined the splits and during this half-hour interval the Rhodesian Prime Minister, Mr lan Smith, and his wife, ehatted to some of the ploughmen and wished them luck.

Ploughing was resumed shortly before lunch. It soon became clear, however, that the contestants were severely handicapped by the moist nature of the soil, and it was

with considerable relief a little latet that they heard the official announcement that their ploughing time had been extended by an hour because of the conditions.

The standard of the first day’s ploughing was so high that few of the many Rhodesian farmers present were able to hazard a forecast of the final results. Many agreed, however, that New Zealand, Britain, West Germany and the Netherlands, had the edge on their rivals.

Although the first day’s scores were not announced until the following night, lan Blair must have sensed he was doing well. “I found the soil very different from the New Zealand soils that I have worked and know well. The stickiness of the soil in the stubble plots caused problems and difficulties, but I managed to overcome these,” he told me.

“And when, at the end of the first day, my team manager, Mr E. A. E. FairhaU, whose advice and guidance proved invaluable, and I examined my ploughing and compared the result with what we saw in the plots of other competi-

tors, I began to realise that I did not fare badly at all. I had covered practically all the stubble, which most of the other contestants bad failed to do," he added. Tension mounted tremendously on the second day when a Dutch contestant, M. A. Th. Schoonen, after trailing in the stubble section, appeared to make rapid headway. He was the eventual winner.

An American competitor, Ned Rhoades, finished equal twelfth but was unlucky on the second day when he had to be towed out of his ploughing strip, after getting bogged down in the heavy soil.

The Canadian, Grant Wells, also had problems' when he broke Ms plough on the second day. “My plough did not cope with conditions on the second day as well u it did on the first day,” he saitbafterwards. “I think tt-ny furrows were an inch wider I would have got rid of the grass bettar. “I think I suffered a bit of a handicap in that I had insufficient practice with the plough before the match. It only arrived on the day before the contest”

Blair said he was impressed by the general appearance of the ploughing site. "Everything looked so neat and tidy," he added. Blair, who farms with sheep, cattle and crops on his SODoere property at Outrun, Otago, started competition ploughing in 1950. He won the New Zealand championship last year and competed in last year's world event in New Zealand. The winner of the 1968 contest, Schoonen, used an Italian Fiat 550 tractor, and a Norwegian mouldboard and disc plough on both the stubble and grassland divisions of the contest His victory was an outstanding one, but the performance of the runner-up, Adolf Preuss, of West Germany, only four pointe behind the winner, was as distinguished, particularly because of the poor state of Ms health. Preuss underestimated

the severity of the Rhodesian autumn sun and wore a light floppy hat on the first day. By late afternoon he developed sunstroke, and in the evening became HL

By next morning, however, he had made sufficient recovery after medical treatment to take his place in the second half of the contest, and although he showed signs of severe strain during the day he pressed on to the end —to the admiration of the large crowd of spectators who watched Mm. One of the international team of judges was Mr T. F. Carter, of Greenpark, Canterbury, New Zealand. The Golden Plough was presented to Schoonen by the Rhodesian Prime Minister at a special publie ceremony in Salisbury at the end of the second day. Mrs Smith

presented the Silver Roes Bowl to the runner-up. All the contestants and officials spent a week’s holiday in Rhodesia after the contest.

Th. writer of thie article about the recent world ploughing contest in Rhodesia is George Nicholas, agricultural editor of the "Rhodesian Herald”. of Salisbury.