It was a triumphant day for Narrabri Performance Horse Association on Saturday as the local sporting group hosted its first event in more than five years.
There were 40 competitors who took part in the highly-anticipated arena sorting event, which saw locals and riders from the wider Narrabri Shire joined by those who travelled from as far as Cessnock, Maitland, Merriwa and Tooraweenah.
The event was the NPHA’s first since October 27 in 2019 when they hosted a No Frills Open Gymkhana.
Drought and the COVID pandemic put events on hold since then, but Saturday’s event saw the association roar back to life.
NPHA’s Tanya Rae described the arena sorting event as a great success.
“We had about 40 there and we were happy with that, being a summer time event and our first one since before COVID,” Rae told The Courier.
“It’s been more than five years since our last event.
“It all ran like clockwork. It couldn’t have gone any better. It was just brilliant.
“We’ve got a new committee with some of the old members still there too, and we have some very keen members now who are happy to help out and do stuff.
“We had great cattle on Saturday and all the competitors were really good with the cattle. They weren’t rough with them or anything like that.
“We had some competitors who did travel some distance to take part, which was great, but they were mostly locals.
“The weather started to heat up as we were finishing at about midday, which was good timing. It went for about four hours.
“There was $870 worth of prize money up for grabs and other prizes that were donated. Some of that prize money was donated by Bohena Pet Motel. They gave us a nice donation which was really lovely, and we thank them for that.”
Arena sorting sees teams of three attempt to sort cattle in numerical order from the mob through a gate to the other end of arena. There is 10 head of cattle in the end of the arena marked with visible numbers from 0 to 9, plus two head of unmarked cattle (clean skins) for a total of 12 head.
The starting number for the team is announced when the nose of the first horse crosses the gateway. Each team on the day starts sorting with the number given by the judge at the commencement of their run, and they continue to sort the cattle in upwards numerical order.
Cattle are considered sorted when a front leg of the beast crosses through the gateway.
The maximum time limit is two minutes, and a warning bell is given with 30 seconds remaining in the run.
The junior under-17 winners on Saturday were a local team named Clancy Crew, which included Laura Bassett, Cael Browning and James King, with a winning time of 2.00, two head. They took out second place as well.
The winning senior team, that also cleaned up with second and third place, were The Three Amigos, which included Cessnock’s Ian Sternbeck, Maitland’s Janelle Osbourne and Merriwa’s Laura Gardner. They had a winning time of 124.38 with 10 head sorted.
Following the success of Saturday’s event, the NPHA is looking to run a twilight arena sorting event early next year in January.
It will get underway at about 4pm and will run into the night and finish under lights.
The association is hopeful that 2025 will be a successful and busy year, with team penning and ranch shows being planned to be held throughout next year.
Pictured at the Narrabri Showground on Saturday during Narrabri Performance Horse Association’s arena sorting event are the junior winning team ‘Clancy Crew’ – Laura Bassett, Cael Browning and James King.
