Sidmouth’s lady bowlers overcame tough opposition from Bitton Park to progress to the next round of the interclub competition against Chudleigh.
This is scheduled to be played at Exonia BC on July 29 at 6pm. The Sidmouth team of Jean Brimson, Janice Quinn, Brenda Somerfield and skip Jill Bishop won 22 –17, while Karen Hollingdale, Sue Turner, Anita Mason and skip Susie Bonnell just lost 18 –20, but it's the aggregate score that counts and that was Sidmouth 40 Bitton Park 37.
In the Men’s County Trophy against Honiton, Sidmouth had two winning rinks out of the four, one home and one away. The home rink of Gordon Brown, Ted Button, "Dutch" Holland and skip David Timms 19 –12, and David's first win in this competition.
The second home rink did very well to reach 9-9 at 11 ends but sadly over the next 10 ends, too many shots were conceded and they lost 12 -27.
The winning away rink was John Richards, Wilf Radburn, Allan Davis and skip John Mason 18 –13, a third win in a row. The aggregate score was Sidmouth 62 Honiton 76.
Karen Hollingdale and Chrissie Leedham have won section 3 final of the County Unbadged Pairs. They now go forward to play the quarter finals against a pair from section 5. As luck would have it, this is played on the challengers’ green, and Sidmouth are the challengers.
Their first game was against another Sidmouth pair, Liz Boyle and Sue Turner, who in their first game had a good win against a pair of Budleigh ladies. Karen and Chrissie won against Liz and Sue, then went on to beat a pair from Seaton.
Sidmouth men played their second round of the Devon TopClub against Madeira BC from Exmouth and Sidmouth were the challengers, so all five disciplines should have been played at home.
Unfortunately, as the leather jackets have caused havoc to our green over the last couple of seasons, the County advised us to play two disciplines at home on our best two rinks and the other three disciplines at Madeira, thus losing the home advantage.
Andrew Lowe had a good win at home in the 2 wood singles. The 4s, also at home, had a very tight game and at the 19th end were 20 –20. Unfortunately, they lost the 20th end by several shots, so very difficult to come back.
I watched this game and I blame the hundreds of seagulls and flying ants, who invaded the green. As a bystander, they drove me to distraction, so they probably affected the players’ concentration.
The triples of John Richards, Roger Stewart and skip John Mason also had a good win in the 4 wood singles but the pairs both lost. You need to win three of the disciplines to go further, so that's it for this year.
Our 12-rink touring team of Bromley & Beckenham District Bowling Association were all staying at one of our seafront hotels and, when not playing, enjoying our lovely town. We played against them with 6 rinks in the morning, and the same in the afternoon.
Sidmouth made our visitors very happy by losing over the two sessions, with the score finishing Visitors 192 - Sidmouth161.
Sidmouth’s best (only) winning morning rink was Steve, Boyle, Zena Johnson, Karen Hollingdale and skip Peter Mison with a great 19 -8 triumph. The afternoon session did somewhat better, winning on three rinks, the best of which was Chas Coates, Wilf Radburn and skip Brenda Somerfield, who also won by11 shots at 20 - 9.
We struggled to field enough players for both sessions, but luckily three Sidmouth men offered to play twice. They were Ron Peppin, Chris Ward and Clive Brooks, and we sincerely thank them all for playing twice in that searing heat.

Sidmouth Herald: Andrew LoweAndrew Lowe (Image: Sidmouth Bowls Club)