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First athletes named for Glasgow 2026 as NZ Team marks 100 days to go
The New Zealand Olympic Committee and Bowls New Zealand are proud to announce the first athletes selected to the New Zealand Team for the Glasgow 2026 Commonwealth Games.
Today also doubles as an important milestone in the lead up to Glasgow 2026 with 100 days to go until the Games.
The bowlers selected to compete in their respective events:
Women’s Singles: Tayla Bruce Women’s Pair: Katelyn Inch, Selina Goddard Men’s Singles: Shannon Mcilroy Men’s Pair: Ali Forsyth, Tony Grantham
Women’s Para Pair (B6-B8): Teri Blackbourn, Julie O’Connell Men’s Para Pair (B6-B8): Mark Noble, Kurt Smith
Mixed Para Pair (B2-B3) : Kerrin Wheeler, Sonya Woodrow and their directors, Colin Wheeler and Kimberly Carraher.
The women’s team is headlined by 2023 Women’s World Singles Champion, Tayla Bruce, who will contest the women’s singles in Glasgow.
It’s such an honour to be selected for the 2026 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow,” said Bruce. “It’s a true pinnacle event for our sport, particularly because it allows us to have the special opportunity to be part of the wider New Zealand team. I’m really looking forward to competing, making the most of the experience, and representing my country with pride,” she said.
Also selected are the 2023 Women’s World Para Pairs Champions, Teri Blackbourn and Julie O’Connell, who will contest the Women’s B6-B8 pair.
“It’s still sinking in that we get to wear the fern at the Commonwealth Games,” said Blackbourn. “To be playing with Julie at the highest level is a dream come true, and sharing the experience alongside our Blackjacks teammates and the wider New Zealand Team makes it even more special. We’re going to enjoy every step of the journey, starting now, as we build towards this incredible event. What an absolute honour,” she said.
Experienced head, Shannon Mcilroy is selected for his fifth Commonwealth Games, having previously represented New Zealand at Delhi 2010, Glasgow 2014, Gold Coast 2018 and Birmingham 2022.
“I’m incredibly honoured to get another opportunity to compete at my fifth Commonwealth Games,” said Mcilroy. “Every Games has given me a new experience, and this one will be no different. The shortened format has made me excited about the opportunity to represent the New Zealand team again. This is our Olympics, so I look forward to the challenge ahead and hopefully, with strong performances, we can bring home some medals,” he said.
The Glasgow 2026 Commonwealth Games Bowls and Para Bowls competition will take place from 24 July to 2 August 2026.
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Click on the photo and read a NZ Herald article about EP’s Mandy Boyd. Fascinating.
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From the National Intercentre.
Congratulations to Kelvin Scott and Gary Lawson who received their third silver star after winning the National Intercentre.
EP well represented in the successful Canterbury men’s intercentre victory. 
From MuzzaWeb’s Roving Reporter.
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Representative Team Funding.
The last time we asked for club to support their representative players the comment was that clubs should have been advised earlier. The teams are about to be announced and once that happens, we are likely to be communicating with their clubs. To help alleviate this financial burden the teams are planning a fundraising event that will provide entertainment for bowlers and sport loving people. The nature of the event and the date will be confirmed soon but we are asking that you keep this event in mind and support this initiative
The more this event raises the less we will be asking players and/or clubs to contribute.
Annual General Meeting. The date for this meeting is Sunday 5 July 2026. This is a week earlier than usual because the following weekend is Matariki Weekend.
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What a fantastic way to begin the year!
From 2-9 January, the Summerset Nationals delivered a week of outstanding competition, brilliant shot-making, and some truly memorable moments on the green. It was wonderful to see players from across the country showcasing their skills, determination, and sportsmanship at such a high standard. We are grateful to our official photographer Barry Jordan for capturing plenty of special moments across many clubs during this time. Have a squizz at his images here.
Just as impressive were the Canterbury greens, which provided an exceptional stage for the action. The quality and consistency of the surfaces were widely admired, allowing the game to be played at its very best and reflecting the huge effort put in behind the scenes. A big thank you to everyone involved for creating conditions that matched the calibre of bowls on display.
As we roll into the heart of summer, the Nationals have set a positive tone for the season ahead and there’s plenty more to look forward to.
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Mark Cameron’s record of the Special General Meeting held 18 November 2025 at the Burnside Bowling Club is available to read here.David has received an email from David Conroy offering to run an umpires course for those who are interested. Please get back to me or Nyalla Tamati if you are interested. It would be nice to get some qualified umpires at our club.
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Well done to the EP members who have been appointed.
Development Women: Neil Buchanan
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Use of Electronic DevicesPursuant to Law 41.7, players with a hearing disability can use electronic devices to communicate with each other while on the rink of play, or with a marker in a singles game.
Electronic devices should not interrupt or interfere with any other players or disrupt the flow of the game. The electronic device must be non-intrusive to other players or officials that are present on the green at any time during a game. As a guide, the use of the device should be no more intrusive (in terms of volume) than any other conversation between players in any game.
In the interests of ensuring that hearing impaired players and their playing partners are able to enjoy their involvement in the game as much as possible, we propose that centres and clubs follow our lead by including this clause in their respective events’ Conditions of Play. The result of not including the above (or similar) to the respective events’ Conditions of Play will be that the devices are not permitted to be used.
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The following changes have been made to the 2025/26 Playing Programme after taking into consideration the submissions we received, the results of the survey, and consultation with the Programme Review Panel.
Also please note next season our development teams will now be from 0-8 years hence the Centre Singles competition will also be 0-8 Years.
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Pre-Christmas Premier Interclub.
This season there will be a Premier Men’s 3×4 Pennants and a Premier Women’s 2×4 Pennants. One team per club. There will be 12 teams in the competition split into two sections of six. The teams will play five round robin games, then play semis and finals – 1v2 and 2v1, 3v4 and 4v3, 5v6 and 6v5. The winners of these games play off for their final placings. The two bottom teams will be relegated. The regulations around clubs entering combined teams will be eased slightly for our smaller clubs. Clubs will need to apply to Bowls Canterbury outlining their intentions. This needs to be forwarded to Bowls Canterbury at least by Monday 15 September to be sanctioned. Seeding from the 2024 Pre-Christmas Interclub will be used initially when teams enter these competitions.
The other teams in these competitions will play seven rounds as in the past, starting from Division 1 to 2 to 3 and so on.
Post Christmas Premier Interclub
We are introducing the Ann Wright Shield for women. This competition will be played using the same format as the Watson Shield. One team per club. This competition starts on Saturday 17 January.
Singles Open and 0-8 Years will be played on the Friday and Sunday of Show Weekend through to the semi finals
Centre Finals will be held for all Open competitions on Saturday 13 December.
The Over 60s Pairs Finals will be held Thursday 4 and Thursday 11 December
There will be no Interclub played when we are hosting the Super Sixes which are being played at Elmwood Park and Bowls Papanui.
The Burnside Stu Buttar Pairs are being played straight after Nationals, one week earlier than in the past.
Bowls3Five Bowls New Zealand will no longer host a national Bowls3Five competition. With only 10 clubs entering teams this season it has been decided that Bowls Canterbury will remove that competition from next season’s programme. Clubs can still have it in their programme, but it will no longer be a Centre event.
Any Combination teams A/C 2×4 Pennants and A/C Eights must have at least two women or two men in each team.
Elmwood Park and St. Andrew’s College.
Each year, EPBC meets with school staff and Bowls Canterbury to discuss the programme offered to St Andrews students. The past season’s programme involved:
Just in case you think Bev and Christine have recently got taller! 
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Some interesting figures from Bowls Canterbury.
We thought these facts and figures might give a bit of an understanding of how difficult it can be finding greens.
47 clubs entered interclub post Christmas requiring 414 rinks.
It is great to have such a high number of entries, but it does put pressure on green space so a big thanks to all clubs and players for understanding the need to move some home games away from home greens.
On the first day of interclub EP had 13 rinks in use, a marvellous sight with two greens almost full.
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Why bowls deserves respect as a bolter’s sport where upsets can prevail.
This is an article from The Press written by Tony Smith.
President Neil suggested it was worthy of a reprint. It’s a good read.
OPINION: The new year is just 10 days old but it is going to be hard to topple bowls bolter Matt Berry’s national singles championship win as the people’s choice sporting moment of 2025.
Berry – who had never won an Auckland centre title or represented his province – beat newly-selected Black Jack international Keanu Darby in a tense final on Thursday.
His victory underlines the magic of bowls – one of the few sports where a club battler can topple a world champion.
Golfers and tennis players can have their off-days, but could you imagine Lydia Ko losing to a Kiwi Espirito Santo amateur? Or Cameron Norrie dropping an Auckland Caro Bowl interclub match to a battler from Birkenhead? Would Luke the Nuke Littler, the latest teen darts sensation lose to a public bar punter? 180 to one, surely.
It’s boring when the outright favourite wins every time, but upsets happen in bowls as frequently as rain squalls scud across the Kiwi summer landscape.
Peter Bellis is a deadset bowls legend. The three-time world champion wrote a book which became the Bible of Kiwi bowlers.
Yet his team, including at least one fellow former New Zealand representative, got knocked off in the 2016 national fours quarterfinals by a side skipped by a redundant Buller coalminer living in a caravan at a Christchurch camping ground.
Lionel Shaw’s four made the final, but there was no storybook finish as their dream run ended in defeat.
Berry, however, grabbed the cake, and the cherry.
No-one was tipping the self-styled “bowls gypsy’’ to go all the way after he lost his first qualifying game.
But once he hit the business end, Berry proved unbeatable. His post-section conquests included two current Black Jacks, Finnbar McGuigan and Darby, and a 21-0 whitewash of a hapless Howick rival.
The Aucklander looked imperturbable as he was interviewed on the green after his 21-17 final win by television commentator John McBeth, yet he reckoned he wasn’t as calm on the inside as the reality of his upset victory set in.
Berry said he “always thought I had it in me’’ and had used affirmation and visualisations and dipped into Bellis’ book to guide him during his giantkilling run.
Matt Berry isn’t the first, and he won’t be the last, to confound the critics at a major bowls tournament.
It is not unusual to glance down the results charts and see some of the sport’s biggest names eliminated in qualifying or bowing out soon after.
That makes the sustained success of world champions like Bellis, Jo Edwards, Val Smith and Gary Lawson and the late, great Nick Unkovich and Millie Khan all the more remarkable.
Bowls deserves more credit from a Kiwi public who seem to dismiss any sport outside the Olympic Games orbit, games involving oval balls chased by 120kg behemoths or codes played in ends rather than overs.
Yet you could not get two more gripping contests than the men’s singles and women’s pairs bowls gold medal contests at Brown’s Bay on Thursday. Anyone following McBeth’s excellent Sky Sport commentary could see and feel the palpable tension.
Finals day also showed the changing face of bowls, which has come a long way from the sedate pastime indulged in by Sir Francis Drake on Plymouth Hoe when warned of the approaching Spanish Armada in 1588.
It’s no longer the preserve of the retiree, in fact it hasn’t been for ages.
Berry had to dig deep to beat a 15-year-old Selwyn College student, Liam Hill, in the singles semifinal. Darby, his grand final rival is 28, but has been playing since his grandfather took him to the Temuka bowls club for a roll-up at 12.
Henrietta Scott, 19, and Ashleigh Jeffcoat, 25, made the women’s pairs final – an event won by Jeffcoat when she was just 17. In the end they lost out to the extra experience of Olivia Bloomfield and Lisa Prideaux in a see-sawing contest.
Bowls may not be an aerobic sport, but the best bowlers have a deft touch which would be welcomed in an All Black first five-eighth and a mathematician’s grasp of equations and angles. They also have great powers of concentration and the stay-in-the-moment skills of meditation master.
Berry had to show nerves of steel to cope with the eddying emotions of going out to a 5-0 lead over Darby then seeing his Dunedin rival recover to wrest the advantage before closing the match out with some clinical deliveries in the final overs.
So bowlers deserve more wider respect. Plenty of Kiwis are darn good at it.
Lincoln University has a great sport-specific scholarship that Lawn Bowlers can apply for. The scholarship is a great opportunity, has great benefits and we highly recommend anyone that is thinking of studying at Lincoln University in Canterbury to apply. This scholarship is available to bowlers who are considered to be our up-and-coming national players. The Elite Scholarship provides up to $6,000 towards tuition fees or accommodation costs for the first year of study. Scholars are able to re-apply in subsequent years of study. In addition, the athletes also receive a comprehensive wraparound programme, which includes access to mental conditioning coaches, nutritionists, physiotherapists, and sports conditioning experts. This scholarship is also available for postgraduate students.
For more information, visit https://www.lincoln.ac.nz/…/lincoln-university-elite…/
or contact Erica: development@bowlscanterbury.co.nz
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BE PROUD OF YOUR CLUB
Learn the laws of the game and if you want to succeed practise as often as you can
and include the rolling of the jack.
Be proud of your club and protect it from gossip.
If you disapprove of some action taken by your committee tell the committee, not the world.
Support your club’s revenue making activities – the benefits will come back to you.
