LYME Regis completed a festival of bowls in glorious sunshine with their annual club finals.

Saturday saw three finals, the first of which was the men’s four-wood pairs as Barry Rattenbury and Rom Hunt took on Steve Pomeroy and Alan Nabarro.

Rattenbury and Hunt led 15-14 after 15 ends but the pendulum swung the other way and Rattenbury showed his frustration as the game slipped away from him, Pomeroy and Nabarro deserved winners at 26-20.

Next up was the ladies’ four-wood championship between arguably the two strongest bowlers in the club, Ann Allman and Pam Weech.

After seven see-saw ends, Allman opened up a four-shot lead which she managed to maintain and stretch to eight shots before Weech started a mini recovery. Allman held her form and ran out the winner at 21-14.

Mary Haseman and Alex Darvill tussled with Tricia Boyd and Pauline Knight in a ladies four-wood pairs game that was difficult to call with Haseman and Boyd final debutants.

After 12 ends Boyd and Knight had a comfortable lead of 20-5 which increased to 23-5 before their opponents fought back to limit the damage to a 24-14 loss.

The final of the five-set singles was a match up between Rattenbury and Simon Dowling, the latter blitzing the first set 7-0 and looked in superb form. Rattenbury came back in the next three sets winning 7-4, 7-3, 7-0 to obviate the need to play a fifth set.

Next, the big one for the men, the four-wood championship between Pomeroy and Hunt.

Pomeroy was at the top of his game and had all the answers, whether it was drawing or playing the weighted shots. This was a master class of bowling as Pomeroy ran out a very comfortable 21-10 winner.

Rattenbury and Pomeroy contested the men’s two-wood singles final and were in wonderful form. Neither player was very far from the jack, this was all about who could remain coolest under pressure.

This proved to be Pomeroy, who picked up a couple of twos at a crucial moment proving too good for Rattenbury in a superb 16-11 win.

Now it was the ladies’ final of the two-wood singles with ladies’ captain Nicky Driscoll up against seasoned competitor Helen Dowling.

Driscoll had this game under control at 15-9 after 17 ends but Dowling fought back to 12-15 at 19 ends. Driscoll then snuck a single on the 20th to win 16-12.

Weech then beat Avril Sherring 21-10 in the Fillies final, Sherring appearing to struggle with injury.

On the following day, Rattenbury met club president Alan Nabarro in the Rocky final.

Nabarro played some superb bowls, peppering the jack end after end but Rattenbury was not going to be denied.

He was in tremendous form throughout this game and proved difficult to beat, so it was as he stormed to a 23-8 win over a shellshocked Nabarro, who did little wrong.

The Ladies’ Invitation final was set up to be a tasty affair as Pam and husband Alan were pitted against each other.

Pam, partnered with Hunt, was in top notch form and had all the answers against Allman and her partner Alan, running out very comfortable winners at 25-10.

‘The Married Couples’ final looked a tasty encounter between Steve and Chris Pomeroy and Simon and Helen Dowling.

Chris was in fine form whilst Helen was unusually wayward on several ends. Simon played well but Steve was still in a rich vein of form enabling the Pomeroys to win 20-11.

The men’s four-wood handicap saw another match-up between Rattenbury and Steve Pomeroy. Now Barry was looking for revenge but started very shakily.

This game ebbed and flowed with a few wicks, some weighted shots that paid off and some that did not, some superb drawing from both bowlers as well as a bit of luck here and there.

Rattenbury’s game did improve markedly and he was able to hold off a tiring Steve 21-17 thus denying the latter a clean sweep in his five finals.

The ladies four-wood handicap was between the experienced Angela Rattenbury and the fast improving Driscoll, the latter proving to be in inspired form as she raced ahead for a comfortable 21-9 win.

The last match of the weekend was the two-wood mixed pairs.

Rod Hobbs and Haseman were taking on Hunt and Lorna Young. The experience of Hunt up front supported by some inspired back-end bowling from Young saw the couple easily cross the winning line at 21-8.

Lyme Regis Bowls Club wish to place on record very special thanks to competitions secretary, Rom Hunt, who in the first full year of office has done such a superb job of running the finals weekend which ran so smoothly.