TWO Lithgow City bowlers are only part of success stories coming from the club lately, returning from a recent Australian tournament with gold medals.
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Mark Sheppard and Michael Johnson were members of the NSW Police Bowling Club team at the 57th Australian Police Bowls Championships held at the Tuncurry Beach Bowling Club on the Mid North Coast of NSW.
Sheppard and Johnson were members of the NSW teams that contested the sides event after going through the week long tournament undefeated to claim the gold medal, the first time for NSW in eight years.
Each state sends a squad of 24 bowlers, 20 of which play each day in a sides event as well as being selected to represent their state in singles, pairs, triples and fours.
Johnson and Sheppard were selected to play in the pairs and fours events as well as the sides, although they didn’t play together.
It was a double celebration for Sheppard who played in the pairs with with Phil O’Reilly from Tamworth.
The pair went on the win the Australian Police Bowls pairs championship, defeating a South Australian team 23-18 in the final.
On their way through they won five games, defeating the defending champions in the semi final before going on to win the final.
The second recent success for Lithgow City came in the Central District pairs event where club champions Jeff Madden and Ian Townsend were crowned champions after the final contested at Mudgee.
The Mudgee venue came about after a boundary redistribution earlier this year, bringing some of the clubs further west into the district, but also losing some of the clubs from the Blue Mountains District in the east.
The City pair were up against the Lithgow Workmens Club duo of Mick McCann and Col Phelan.
The experience of Madden and Townsend, ironically former Workies bowlers, shone through in the final.
The third success for City bowlers came with the finalisation of the Central Mountains combined No 2-3-4 grade pennant at the weekend.
Due to Lithgow City defeating the No 2 grade side Gulgong, that club was eliminated and now Lithgow City will go on to contest the Zone titles in June at a venue still to be finalised.
Lithgow City was not so successful in the lower grades, with the No 6 winners being Mudgee and the No 7s title going to Rylstone.
In the Central Mountains district triples championship Madden, Sheppard and Townsend have team up to win their way through to the final where they will play the Lithgow Workmens Club team of Garry Green, Ken Poppett and “Pud” Warren on April 11 on the Portland greens.
Social bowls
In the mixed social bowls on Sunday Warren Kennedy and Rod McMurtrie powered their way through their game to win with 14+14, the runners-up being well back on 11+5 and being won by Cheryl Wotton and Darrel Wright.
Friday’s mixed socials saw Peter Rutherford bring home his team of B Baker and Derek Bedford to take the top spot with 13+22.
Second spot, but with not as large a winning margin, went to Col Wotton and Stan Campbell with 13+9.
