Highland Games Grows

THIS years 18th Highland Games at Aberdeen was met with perfect weather and an estimated crowd of 8000 people.

The Tamworth District Highland Society Pipe Band took out the band honors and the strongmen from the Tartan Warriors entertained the crowd and triumphing on the day to be the Aberdeen highland Games Champion was Scott Hall who won the stones and sheaf events and although placing fourth in the caber toss still had the points to prevail.

Muswellbrook St Vincent DePaul won the window dressing competition and the tug of war titles by Maitland in the 680 and 600, West Coast in the 720 and the Brisbane Bulldogs in the mixed 680 and 600.

Charles Cook, President of the Highland Games committee was happy with the turnout and the conditions for this years event.

“It couldn’t have been better, it was glorious, we reckon the crowd was equal to or a bit better than last year, we ended up with ten bands with Tamworth being the winner,” Charles Cook said.

“We had them from Moree, Tamworth, Armidale and then from down the valley Newcastle and some from Sydney as well as the local bands.

“The competition run by the Tartan Warriors are a good group of professional muscle men and we get them every year, one of their competitors was a dual Australian Olympian shotputter and one of them was a Swede who held the Swedish discus championship.

“It was very well attended they came from all over, the bulk came from the Hunter, Central Coast and the metropolitan area but we had some from Brisbane, Victoria and some from South Australia.

“The Cheifton, the Honorable Sandy MacDonald did and excellent job and we have a very hard working committee who did a marvelous job.

“It makes life a lot easier when you’ve got a committee that works and I am grateful for that, it’s a bit of an ongoing saga, we now have to tidy up and it’s a lot of work for one day of the year but we think it is well and truly worth it.

“We had Australian Defence Force Federation Guard and they did several dispaly’s which was very well received, we had a highland dance display and we hosted the National Tug-of-War titles.

“We are talking about things that we might do for next year already,” said Charles Cook.