Australian Championships shine light on coastal tourism
A wrap-up of the Australian Championships, as reported by the Merimbula News.
One of Australian bowling’s most prestigious events wrapped up at Club Sapphire last week.
The Australian Championships were held under the dome of the new Merimbula bowling complex with four days of top level competition showcased on the greens.
Fours, triples, pairs and singles formats were contested in both men’s and women’s divisions.
Club Sapphire’s bowls director Michael Wilks said the event was providing a huge profile boost for tourism to the area.
“The real benefit is the profile, the live streams were hitting 20,000 people per game and the comments were helping lift Merimbula as a tourism destination,” Wilks said.
After the second event in a three-year deal to host the national event, Wilks said there had already been people visiting the area just on the profile of the Championships.
“I would bump into people playing barefoot bowls and they saw the competition and ‘just want to see the area for themselves’,” he said.
Both he and the club are “very proud of what we’re doing” as Wilks said there were very few opportunities to provide that level of recognition for a club or an area in general.
“It’s great for our club, this area and to do it through the sport we love is enormous.”
Wilks said there were two surprise results across the four-day national contest.
The first being the men’s triples win to the Queensland team who were skippered by 19-year-old Mitchell Mears.
“That is a huge result to see a kid of his age win the Australian title,” Wilks said.
“And the surprise upset had to be Natasha Scott, whose triples team bombed out in their section.”
The defending champions had backed up their 2017 win with another state championship to qualify this year – but an off-day kept them out of the hunt for a medal.
Wilks thanked everyone who supported the event over the week, with a number of spectators joining in to cheer on the teams.
“We want to thank everyone in the community who got behind it or came to watch,” Wilks said.
Another boost for locals was gold medallists and Bowls Australia officials joining in play at the local junior academy.
“It’s great to see those level of players putting a bit of time back into our local community, especially with those younger kids,” Wilks said.
The benefits for the Far South Coast are palpable, but it’s also raising the profile of Merimbula as a home of genuine competition with state flag winners and some top level bowlers making the trip to play.
“We’re becoming recognised as a serious venue – not just for the facilities, but our bowls as well,” Wilks said.
“Bowls is an all-inclusive sport and we would love to see more people down here taking advantage of it.”
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Caption: A wrap-up of the Australian Championships as reported in the Merimbula News
