600 skittlers and supporters raised the roof at the 5th Blackthorn British Skittles Championship Grand Finals at Sand Bay Leisure Resort, Weston-super-Mare on Saturday 20th September. After 5 months of group rounds and knockout matches, 48 qualifying teams from across the skittling counties let battle commence to find the Men’s, Ladies and Mixed Blackthorn Champions for 2008. Amazing performances from all teams concluded in three fantastic finals in which teams from Gloucester, Bath, Cornwall, Devon and Somerset faced the ultimate challenge to see if they could be the best skittles team in Britain.
The winning prize money of £1,500 for the Men’s and £1,000 for the Ladies and Mixed teams, trophies, medals and Blackthorn goodies and the coveted title of Blackthorn British Skittles Champions 2008 were awarded as follows:
Men’s Champions: Bath City from Bath
Ladies Champions: The Sinners from Exeter
Mixed Champions: Satellites Scorching Hoppers from Gloucester
Runners up in each event with Men’s receiving £750 and Ladies and Mixed £500 and Blackthorn goodies were as follows:
Men’s runners up: Mixers from Totnes, Devon
Ladies runners up: Everhopefuls from Pensilva, Cornwall
Mixed runners up: Club Mixers from Wellington, Somerset
The last 16 teams in each of the 3 events got the ball rolling shortly after 10am as the Grand Finals for 2008 kicked-off. For teams that fell at the first hurdle, a plate event was held and the results were as follows:
Men’s plate winners: Eliot B from Malmesbury, Wiltshire
Men’s plate runner-up: Frome Con Club from Frome, Wiltshire
Ladies plate winners: Royal TOTS from Taunton, Somerset
Ladies plate runner-up: AKA Angels from Weston-super-mare, Somerset
Mixed plate winners: Stop Fookin Aboot from Weston-super-Mare, Somerset
Mixed plate runners-up: Our Gang from Bath
All 48 teams who reached the Grand Finals received a special rate accommodation of £10.50 sponsored by Martyn Leisure Resorts and Hotels for the Saturday night and were entertained by the fantastic Blues Brother Tribute Band, disco and karaoke.
The Press Officers Award was won for the second year by Brian Sage of Wrington Sports for presenting the best local press coverage for the event. Runner up was Dave Rowe of The Saints and third place was Sarah Ilott from Coleford RBL.
Press officer winner – Brian Sage
The Blackthorn Home Alley award was presented to St Thomas Social Club in Exeter, home alley to the Ladies Champions, The Sinners and men’s teams The Saints and Allstars
A huge thank you to all the teams that took part making this the biggest and best Blackthorn Championships ever! Roll on 2009!
To register your interest or to find out more about the Blackthorn British Skittles Championships 2009 click here
To view all the results and tables you will need Adobe Reader installed on your computer - it's available as a free download from Adobe if you don't already have it. Click here to get Adobe Reader .
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