150 MISS SACK RACE

Press, Volume CXIV, Issue 33446, 30 January 1974, Page 1

150 MISS SACK RACE

(By

JOHN COLLINS)

Hand-picked squads of 1 Salvation Army bandsmen were last night feeding tea and buns to 1 exhausted volunteers as the huge search-and-rescue operation, aimed at finding about 150 visiting spectators miss- [ ing from the Tenth t Agricultural and Pastoral Show at Spencer’s Gully, moved into its second day. Il

None of the missing spectators has yet been found, and the head of the Gully security squad’s rescue effort, Constable Glistenin Pate, says the search may be extended — through Interpol — to Kaiapoi, Yald; hurst, and Ashburton. Many of the missing had been expected from these towns. The spectators were first missed when an official noted that half of the seats in the new domain, designed to seat more than 300, were not occupied. An immediate inquiry was

made, and it was found that none of the missing had checked into motels in the Gully. Furthermore, shop and restaurant owners began to telephone the security squad with reports of a definite discrepancy between the number of visitors and the estimates by the ticket sales committee. “Something was obviously up,” Constable Pate told reporters in the comfort of his newly-erected security squad car-port. “I knew from my experience as a harrier that it was necessary to move fast, so I decided to call out the full search-and-rescue squad. He was a bit disgruntled, but he perked up after a cup of coffee.” Constable Pate outlined the new strategy that the Gully security squad had designed to bring the missing spectators to the show when they had been located. He said that the squad, upon discovering a sufficient concentration of missing visitors, would set up a dummy beer tent and issue invitations to a social inside it. Then the

squad would storm the tent, using laughing gas and firing putty bullets. “It’s devastatingly simple,” the constable grinned, casually rubbing liniment into his regulation-issue socks. “We shall then charge them all with unlawful assembly and possession of Gully property — the putty bullets — and transport them to the domain.”

Informed sources close to the constable report that the security squad had been on full alert for the previous three days. The alert followed rumours that a Latvian terrorist may have brought an Ashburton-made ground-to-air record player into the Gully with the intention of playing popular music at the competitors from Kaiapoi and driving them into a frenzy of law-breaking and unbridled lust.

“Our inquiries show that almost 100 per cent of people arrested for crime in the Gully had at some time been exposed to popular music—often at an impressionable age,” the constable explained. “When it became apparent

that a high proportion of people charged with traffic offences had a radio in the car with them, it was obviously time to step in.” Last Wednesday the security squad decided to ban all popular music in the Gully during the period of the show.

The search for the Latvian terrorist has led to several arrests, including the apprehension of a Hororata discusthrower, who was caught hurling a long-playing record of David Bowie into the domain. He broke the record, but was immediately arrested. Amid the turmoil of the search-and-rescue exercise and the security clamp-down, the competition continues. The upset win came in the paddock events —led by Kaiapoi, which has two bronzes, two silvers, a gold, a brass inlaid with black enamel, and a stamp album. The upset was in the sack race, when the giant Latvian pig-breeder. Anatole Kleb, was ground into submission by Mrs Gollit, arisen like a phoenix from the ashes of her col-

lapsed pavlova in the Home Produce (Miscellaneous).

The giant Latvian was expected to sweep the field (and perhaps spruce up the grandstand) in this event. He had announced his intention to use the new plastic super sack recommended by the Gully council. Most of the other competitors were using the old paper sack which, according to the council, is

more expensive to run, liable to become soaked and discharge the occupant if raced on a wet day, and is subject to attack by animals if the competitor decides to sleep in it at the kerb overnight. But Kleb was only yards in the lead when he burst into the boiling cauldron of the Gully domain. When he tripped over a passing 70stone two-tooth ewe only feet from the line the council marshals refused to help him to his feet in case his sharp knees cut through the plastic and injured them. Hysterically cackling, “So much for your stereos, hot lips,” Mrs Gollit burst past and chested the tape. Kleb, injured in the fall,