It would, on the other hand, be a nice little earner for sheep shearers.

ECONOMIST: Monitor

As the final approached, six shearers waited nervously in the changing rooms.

WSJ: For Shear Thrills, Nothing Beats This Competition

Before the event, show officials said it was a major attraction and visitors enjoyed watching as shearers clipped a sheep's fleece in a trial against the clock.

BBC: Six shearing world titles won at Royal Welsh Show

In the end, New Zealander John Kirkpatrick, 41, took away the Golden Shears Open Shearing Final, which is open to all shearers whether they made their national team or not.

WSJ: For Shear Thrills, Nothing Beats This Competition

Named Blanket Bay (after the blankets used by sheep shearers here in the 19th century to keep wool dry), the resort is the type of luxe but rough-hewn lodge one might expect to find in the Adirondacks or at Lake Tahoe.

FORBES: "We Weren't Hut People"

The continent's vast interior - "the bush" - captured the first settler's imagination, giving the colonies their mythology of shearers, miners and bushrangers. (Before 1903, a swim during daylight hours could get you arrested.) But as the 20th Century dawned, the coastal cities boomed and rural life was eclipsed by the new nation's factory jobs and suburbs.

BBC: Shore thing: Australia��s beach obsession