Julie Forrest (born 3 November 1968) is a

Scottish Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including: *Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland *Scottish English *Scottish national identity, the Scottish ide ...

bowls Bowls, also known as lawn bowls or lawn bowling, is a sport in which players try to roll their ball (called a bowl) closest to a smaller ball (known as a "jack" or sometimes a "kitty"). The bowls are shaped (biased), so that they follow a curve ...

player. She reached a career high ranking of world number 2 in March 2025.

Bowls career

Outdoors

Julie has won three World Outdoor medals, a silver medal in the fours at the

2000 World Outdoor Bowls Championship The 2000 Men's World Outdoor Bowls Championship was held at Marks Park Bowling Club, in Johannesburg, South Africa, from 1 to 15 April 2000. The 2000 Women's World Outdoor Bowls Championship was held at Moama Bowling Club in Moama Moama ( ...

Johannesburg Johannesburg ( , , ; Zulu language, Zulu and Xhosa language, Xhosa: eGoli ) (colloquially known as Jozi, Joburg, Jo'burg or "The City of Gold") is the most populous city in South Africa. With 5,538,596 people in the City of Johannesburg alon ...

and two bronze medals as part of the Scottish team that competed in the Taylor Trophy. She also competed at the

1996 1996 was designated as: * International Year for the Eradication of Poverty Events January * January 8 – A Zairean cargo plane crashes into a crowded market in the center of the capital city of the Democratic Republic of the Congo ...

2000 2000 was designated as the International Year for the Culture of Peace and the World Mathematics, Mathematical Year. Popular culture holds the year 2000 as the first year of the 21st century and the 3rd millennium, because of a tende ...

and

2016 2016 was designated as: * International Year of Pulses by the sixty-eighth session of the United Nations General Assembly. * International Year of Global Understanding (IYGU) by the International Council for Science (ICSU), the Internationa ...

. She was selected to represent Scotland at the

Commonwealth Games The Commonwealth Games is a quadrennial international multi-sport event among athletes from the Commonwealth of Nations, which consists mostly, but not exclusively, of territories of the former British Empire. The event was first held in 1930 ...

1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The ''Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for Lunar water, frozen water, in soil i ...

and also won the

Scottish National Bowls Championships The Scottish National Bowls Championships is one of the oldest bowls competitions in the world. In 1892, James Brown of Sanquhar Bowling Club and Dr Clark of the Partick Bowling Club formed the Scottish Bowls Association and organised the first ...

pairs title in 1988 and triples title in 1997 bowling for Hawick.

Indoors

Most of her success has come indoors with her most significant wins being the three WBT women's singles titles and two WB women's singles titles. Forrest competed in the 2015

World Cup Singles World Cup Singles The World Cup Singles was an event inaugurated in 2005 by the organisation known as World Bowls and was held until 2019. It was contested annually between bowlers from national bowls organisations. The competition was seen as th ...

, where she won a silver medal after losing out to Siti Zalina Ahmad in the final, the event is the southern hemisphere equivalent of the World Indoor title. The following year, Forrest finished runner-up at the 2016 World Indoor Bowls Championship in the mixed pairs, At the 2019 World Indoor Bowls Championship she defeated

Alison Merrien Alison Jayne Merrien (born 28 November 1974) is an indoor bowls player from Saint Peter Port, Guernsey. She reached a career high ranking of world number 11 in June 2024. Bowls career By virtue of winning her national title she qualified t ...

in the final and at the 2020 World Indoor Bowls Championship, she defeated Janice Gower in teh final. Forrest went on to win her third World indoor title by winning the mixed pairs with Stewart Anderson at the 2021 World Indoor Bowls Championship. She has won seven IIBC indoor titles, including a record four ladies singles titles (2004, 2010, 2013, 2014) and three mixed pairs titles (2002, 2003, 2013). Forrest also won the last three editions of the WBT Scottish Women's Masters. She is also a record six-time Scottish indoor champion and a three-time British Isles indoor champion in singles competition. In 2022, Forrest won the women's singles at the inaugural

World Bowls Indoor Championships The World Bowls Indoor Championships is bowls event inaugurated in 2019 by the organisations known as World Bowls and the International Indoor Bowls Council (IIBC). It is contested annually between bowlers from national bowls organisations. The ...

, defeating Gloria Ha in the final. The following year she retained the

title A title is one or more words used before or after a person's name, in certain contexts. It may signify their generation, official position, military rank, professional or academic qualification, or nobility. In some languages, titles may be ins ...

after beating

Katelyn Inch Katelyn Inch (born 19 August 1995) is a New Zealand international lawn bowler. She reached a career high ranking of world number 14 in June 2024. Bowls career World Championships Inch was born in Rangiora and brought up in Oxford, New Zealand ...

in Warilla, Australia. Forrest started 2024 in good form winning the 2024 World Indoor Bowls Championship mixed pairs with Nick Brett, as the pair bowled together for the first time in the Championships. At the 2025 World Indoor Bowls Championship, she won her third ladies' singles title, defeating Beth Riva in the final.

Awards

Forrest is a member of the Teviotdale Indoor Bowls Club in the

Scottish Borders The Scottish Borders is one of 32 council areas of Scotland. It is bordered by West Lothian, Edinburgh, Midlothian, and East Lothian to the north, the North Sea to the east, Dumfries and Galloway to the south-west, South Lanarkshire to the we ...

. She is also an Honorary Life Member of the Scottish Indoor Bowling Association (SIBA). Forrest has been playing with Tiger Bowls since 2003. She was inducted into the Scottish Borders Hall of Fame in 2007.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Forrest, Julie Scottish female bowls players 20th-century Scottish sportswomen Bowls players at the 1998 Commonwealth Games 1968 births Living people Indoor Bowls World Champions Commonwealth Games competitors for Scotland Bowls European Champions 21st-century Scottish sportswomen