The North Harbour Open Billiards was held on 11th-12th September 1999 at the Snooker World, Royal Oak, Auckland. Wayne Carey comfortably beat fellow Aucklander and defending champion Merv Stewart 525-344 to win the two-hour final.
Carey showed good form in his semi-final match against Ron Milicich, making breaks of 99 (missing a screw in-off with the rest), 90 and 69, finishing with an aggregate of 702 points. His 99 proved to be the highest break of the tournament. Merv Stewart's semi-final against Ray Habgood was considerably closer. With about 40 minutes left, Stewart led by over 100 points and appeared to have the match well in hand, only for Habgood to fight back with a break of 59. But it wasn't enough and Stewart won by 106 points.
Carey began the final well, scoring a 77 on his second visit only for Stewart to respond a few visits later, with a run of 62. After an hour the scores were still close, Stewart holding a two point advantage at 206- 204. The next thirteen minutes were the turning point of the match, with Carey making breaks of 48 and 53 while Stewart made only 3 points. Carey built on this lead and went on to win by 181 points, although Stewart had the satisfaction of making a 59 break late in the match. Results : Semi-finals (2 hours) Wayne Carey 702; Ron Milicich 304. Merv Stewart 445; Ray Habgood 339. Final (2 hours) Wayne Carey 525; Merv Stewart 344.
The New Zealand Open attracted 18 players from throughout the North Island, and was held at the Hamilton Cosmopolitan Club, Hamilton, over 3 days starting Friday 1st October. The event resulted in a victory for Wayne Carey who beat Darcy Boyce of Otorohanga 982-571 in the three- hour final to retain the title he won last year. Carey also had the highest break of the tournament, a 115 scored in group qualification stages. He has now won the last 12 New Zealand tournaments he has entered. In his semi-final match, Wayne Carey repeated his recent victory over Merv Stewart by a comfortable margin of 285 points. The other semi- final, between Darcy Boyce and Derek Gibb, was close until Boyce scored a break of exactly 100. He then started making greater use of defensive play. Gibb, who had missed the previous tournament due to an extended stay in England following the IBSF Championships, was unable to close the gap and lost by 123 points.
In the final, Carey made the first significant contribution with a 97 (9 minutes 50 seconds) to establish a 100 point lead, which he had extended to 180 at the interval. During the break, Carey accidentally potted Boyce's ball in taking the score to 52. He then made 14 hazards to go to 94. For his fifteenth hazard, Carey attempted a six-shot by potting the red off the centre spot into the left baulk pocket and going in-off into the left middle pocket. He got the in-off but missed the pot, the red wobbling in the jaws, to leave Carey three short of his fourth century of the tournament. About 15 minutes before the end of the session, Boyce made some comments about the run of the balls and this resulted in exchanges between the players as each were playing their strokes. The exchanges appeared to break the concentration of Carey and he finished the session with an average of 17.6.
With Boyce unable to respond, it became a question of whether Carey would reach 1000 points before the end of the match. He did not, failing by 18 points, the final score being 982 (av 15.3) - 571 (8.8). After the event, Boyce said he had planned to announce his retirement, but because of his success at this tournament he has decided to continue playing billiards. Results : Semi-finals (2 hours) Wayne Carey 600; Merv Stewart 315. Darcy Boyce 512; Derek Gibb 389. Final (3 hours) Wayne Carey 982; Darcy Boyce 571.
After making a clean sweep of all the tournaments this year, Wayne Carey finished some distance ahead of his nearest rival in the New Zealand ranking list. The final positions and the points earned, are as follows : 1 Wayne Carey (Auckland) 4060; 2 Derek Gibb (Capital City) 2677; 3 Darcy Boyce (Waikato) 1945; 4 Merv Stewart (Auckland) 1787; 5 Tony Stephens (Hawkes Bay) 1595; 6 Ron Milicich (Auckland) 1428; 7 Gary Oliver (Canterbury) 1390; 8 Peter de Groot (Canterbury) 1004; 9 Joe Ifa (Waikato) and Ray Habgood (North Harbour) 808; 11 Rob Elvin (Bay of Plenty) 709; 12 Ray Reid (Hawkes Bay) 684; 13 Malcolm Cooke (Capital City) 682; 14 Colin Taylor (Bay of Plenty) 626; 15 Warren Burke (Capital City) 469; 16 John Keatley (Counties) 450; 17 Gerry Wake (Bay of Plenty) 415; 18 Peter Stephen (Hawkes Bay) 414; 19 Byron Brooke (Hawkes Bay) 363; 20 Paul Wereta (Canterbury) 342;