After winning Section 3 final in the Men’s Senior 4's County Competition, four Sidmouth players were due to play a marathon session to hopefully reach the national finals at the home of England bowls in Leamington Spa, writes Carol Smith.

Sadly, as two of our players were not available to play on the final date, they needed to concede. Commiserations to Andrew Lowe, David Timms, Mick Cox, Ken Wheeler and substitute John Richards.

The Spears Trophy is a Ladies Invitation game, where we invite a rink from six local clubs to play against six Sidmouth rinks. The format is a drive where each visiting rink, for just four ends, will play each Sidmouth rink.

As usual at half-time, there was a lovely tea organised by Jill Bishop and Chris Ward , then served by John Mason and Ron Peppin, who thankfully also did the washing up! The bar stewards were Tony Anthony and Sue Doughty.

A great afternoon, once again played in brilliant sunshine, and good company. I doubt very few have needed to wear their ‘wets’ well so far this season?

The invited teams were Honiton, Budleigh, Ottery, Seaton and Madeira. Exonia were not able to make it this year. This year’s winners were Ottery, led by Shirley Frutrell with a plus score of 15 shots. The Sidmouth rink of Julie Wevill, Janet Thomson and Jill Bishop were a worthy second.

After a good win in the first round of the Grace Mathews TopClub Competition, our second round was away to Ottery St Mary. This was a very close game, with either side once again needing to win three of the five disciplines. Shots don't count in this game, just a win, even by one shot.   

Our triples of Mary Turner, Zena Johnson and skip Jill Bishop won, as did our 4's of Chris Ward, Barbara Donaldson, Carol Timms and skip Sue Turner. Jane Painter did  extremely well in the 4 wood singles against Shirley Frutrell, but sadly lost. Also our pairs and two wood singles lost, so try again next year.