Organiser, Michael Ivanov, said $1652 was raised and 16 teams entered the event.

“The overall winners of the day were the team of Ron Walton, Reg Riley and Wayne Tighe with the team of David Williams, Colin Muggleton and Wendy Munroe coming home in second place,” he said.

During the bowls day, there were a number of mini competitions run to raise more money and give players a chance to win some prizes.

“We also held a raffle which was a really great success and we had a barbecue supplied for everyone who attended,” Ivanov said.

A highlight for the day, according to  Ivanov, was to see how many young people were participating in the event.

“This day has been running for a good 20 years now and on Saturday about a third of the players were young. Without them, the day wouldn’t continue on,” he said.

The event started when a group of Garah bowlers travelled into Moree to play a social day of bowls.

“One of the men who used to travel in, Bob Murray, passed away so we decided to hold a memorial day each year for him and donate it to the hospital,” Ivanov said.

As the years passed, many of the original bowlers have passed away, so the event changed from a memorial day to a charity day.

“One of the men had kidney problems and he passed away so we decided to donate the money to the renal unit committee and we’ve been doing it ever since,” he said.

During the past 20 years, Ivanov said the group would have raised an excess of $10,000, but it had never been officially recorded.

“This year we had a few more people jump on board for the day and I think it may have been because we pushed the event forward so it was in between harvest seasons,” he said.

Ivanov thanked everyone who donated, participated and sponsored the day.

“It’s just a fun way to raise money for a good cause,” he said.

“The Renal Unit Committee recently won a volunteer award at the Hunter New England Health Excellence Awards (see Tuesday, August 26 Moree Champion) so hopefully this bit of money will start them off for the next year.”