Monday, February 04, 2008

February 2008 issue























There’s lots of cool news today, and we’ll get to that in a moment. But for now, the February 2008 issue of The Curling News is in the building – got yours yet?

Regina Will Rock: the ultimate Scotties preview
Pal Trulsen does Dubai
– Guest column by Ben Hebert: Be Careful What You Wish For
Chevy and Witt: the ultimate curling sendoff
– A supersized edition of the JVC TV Curling Guide: where to find men’s provs in N.B, Alberta, B.C., Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Ontario and more
Martin and Howard: double Slam wrap and next stop: St. John’s
– A Tale of Two Cities: in Toranna and The Peg, curlers just wanna have fun
– Fun II: 10 years later, we expose Canada’s legendary Nagano moonshot
– A Tale of Two Ryans: and millions of MySpace hits
– Ferb Furor: Randy Ferbey lets it all hang out
– All Hail the Blogosphere: new entries from The Gap, Hogtown and more
– Outdoor curling part two: Montreal’s Fraser Highlanders
They Said It: a supersized edition of curling’s most eye-popping quotes
– More They Said It: is Olympic status ruining curling?
The Dominion of Canada Club Corner: the challenges clubs face
The Business of Curling: three spring symposiums for clubs
Rodger Schmidt on the Controversial Cup

... and MORE!


Elsewhere...

Russ Howard gets a week-long tryout as a TSN curling commentator – his second go ’round – as the morning draw colourman at next month’s Tim Hortons Brier. He’ll be paired with Vic Rauter, while stalwarts Ray Turnbull and Linda Moore work with Rauter for the evening draws. Bob Weeks has the scoop ...

• And here’s our scoop: following his success as Rogers TV curling commentator in Toronto in December, Eddie “The Wrench” Werenich will return as the Rogers TV curling colourman for the final three days of the Ontario men’s championship, which starts today in K-W (preview stories here and here) . Draw 1 (1:00pm ET) features defending-everything-champ Glenn Howard against Rob Todd, while former champ at-just-about-every-position Peter Corner takes on Rob Lobel (7:30pm ET) ...

Murrdogg reports that Mark Lang, a 2002 Sask Brier rep with Scott Bitz (who now plays for Joel Jordison) will partner with Global TV’s Warren Woods for coverage of the Sask Tankard, which starts Wednesday.

Former Sask Brier skip Lyle Muyres is the regular guy, but he’s watching his son Dallan compete at the Canadian Junior men’s this week ...

• Kudos also to Eugene Hritzuk: he won the Sask Seniors; he starts play in the Tankard on Wednesday (he was runner-up last year to Pat Simmons), he spared for Toronto’s Wayne Middaugh in a game at the Masters; and was also mentioned in Friday’s blogpost about Great Prairie Names (TM). Popular guy ...

• Lots of Canadian men’s provincials start today (like B.C.) or on Wednesday (like Nova Scotia) and a few go the following week (like Alberta) ...

• Long-time Ottawa Rideau ice technician Gerry Keeler died on Saturday, after further complications from health problems suffered on the eve of December’s JSI Insurance Canada Cup East tourney. Keeler had been on the job for some 35 years.

The funeral will be at 11:00 am on Friday February 8th, with a reception to follow at the Rideau Curling Club (details here). Meanwhile, a Facebook page has sprung up in his honour ...

• The Windsor Curling Club in Nova Scotia not only plans to rebuild on their original site – by October, no less – they also had 270 people come out for a 100th anniversary whoopup ...

We like this quote, from emcee and past president Kevin Matheson:

Tonight proves we didn’t lose our curling club, we only lost our building.

• Anything else to remember from the Windsor arson incident? Get your club a new, simple yet comprehensive insurance plan... and do it right the heck now!

• Speaking of club planning and finances: Monsanto Canada has seriously upped the ante following an overwhelming response to their Imagine a Better House community curling club bursary program ...

Don Turner passed away about a year ago – maybe more? – but his fantabulous curling museum lives on in fanatbulous Weyburn, Saskatchewan ...

Paul Wiecek is reporting that Kevin Koe’s Edmonton boys just got snubbed by the Alberta curling cops. Seems the awesome retro unis the boys unveiled at the Masters last week “contravene the association’s uniform policy” and now the lads have to spend some $1,500 to re-embroider new duds for the provincial.

Can you say marketing opportunity missed?

The top three seeds at that shootout, by the by, are Team Kevin Martin, Team Koe and Team Randy Ferbey ...

• Bad news from Gander, Newfoundland, where the famed DBC is no more ...

• Curling stories abound in the U.S., from Rochester, NY... to Mitch who got his curl on in St. Paul... to Detroit, where their membership numbers are up... to sunny Cali, where Greg just wants to curl before he dies ... in Bismark, North Dakota, where they did a little outdoor spieling... and in Walpole, MA, at the home of an all-outdoor club (thanks to CurlDuluth for the video evidence).

Did you enjoy the January issue feature outdoor curling in The Curling News? Yeah, we know you did... we have been besigned by stories and photos, indicating you guys just love to get your outdoor freak on.

So make sure you check out the February issue of The Curling News (see top story) for part two of our new, revised three-part feature on outdoor curling. That’s right.. we are stretching this baby out, all the way to the March issue!

• Speaking of Yanks, the Chicks With Brooms are battling for the U.S. junior women’s title this week. We’re rooting for them because they choose the long-forgotten kilt ...

• DID YOU KNOW: that it was in Bobcaygeon, where we saw the constellations, reveal themselves, one star at a time ...?

• Harbin is number one in Chinese domestic curling. No surprise there ...

• And finally, an Edmonton Sun online poll from Jan. 20 posed the question What would get more kids involved in curling? There were only three not-very-serious answer options, and here are the results:

Remote-control stones – 26 per cent
The friendly competition – 37 per cent
Big-screen TVs on every sheet – 37 per cent

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