Tim Hortons curling stories

Curling sponsor Tim Hortons  introduced a curling contest back in early October, part of their “Every Cup Tells a Story” campaign.

Websurfers were invited to tell their own curling story (involving Tim Hortons, of course)  and the public gets to vote, online, for the best tale.

The winning storyteller will be named Grand Prize Winner of a trip for two to the final weekend of the Tim Hortons Canadian Curling Trials in Edmonton, which starts on December 6. The trip includes flights, accommodations and tickets to the Women’s and Men’s Finals at the Roar of the Rings.

Storytellers could even upload their own photo to accompany their story.

Why are we using the past tense? Apparently, the contest is now closed.

Geez. While we are somewhat amazed we didn’t hear about this contest, we are also miffed no one told us about it. Like.... Tim Hortons? The Canadian Curling Association, perhaps?

While TCN Blogreaders might not be able to submit their own story, they can still vote on their favourite story, and help declare the winner. Visit this page and scroll through the multitude of curling stories, and cast your vote today!

TCN readers could definitely play a role in the decision, for there seems to be an eight-way-tie going on between For the love of the game (from Hubbards, NS); 3 Generations (from Waterford, ON); The Day I Knew (Bowmanville, ON); Horsmans take on Jimmy The Kid (Quispamsis, NB); Summer of 2001 (Chase, BC); How I Met My Husband (Belnan, NS); Twilight Curling (Calgary) and the story we voted for: A Curling Legend (Norwood, ON).

Anything else? Yes, lots, but you need to follow the TCN Twitter feed, to learn more about:

• how you can watch the Olympic Torch run LIVE online

• Fox Sports Austalia and their curling insults

• Roar of the Rings tickets: are sales lagging?

• video of Olympian Deb McCormick on Last Call with Carson Daley

• Yowza, Mr, Zawada

• Manitoba team heads to Dominion Club Championship

• PEI teams chasing Canada Games berths

and more to come throughout the day, of course...

Curling team sponsors rock

The Continental Cup is back. For three years, starting in 2011.

And while that is a great story, we like one of the underlying themes even better. Read on.

Turns out the rumours of the Cup demise were premature. The Canadian Curling Association and World Curling Federation have agreed on the relaunch after this year’s hiatus – there is no Cup event held during Olympic seasons – and their decision was no doubt made easier with the news that World Financial Group will be the title sponsor.

“We are most happy to welcome World Financial Group into our partnership with the CCA, allowing us to continue the Continental Cup in a stronger financial position, thanks to their support,” said Les Harrison, WCF President. “This competition has been an important showcase of the world's most talented curlers in a very unique format, which has enabled us to develop and promote our sport through a variety of disciplines.”

Indeed, the Ryder Cup-esque feel of the event, which features Team World versus Team North America in a variety of curling disciplines, has led to the creation of the World Mixed Doubles format, which may become an Olympic discipline in time for Sochi 2014.

But our favourite line in the CCA news release is this one, from World Financial Group of Canada president Rick Williams.

“Our commitment to sponsor the Continental Cup is an example of our commitment to supporting curling in Canada, which began four years ago with our sponsorship of the Randy Ferbey team,” said Williams.

“The participation of curling teams from across the globe parallels our reach as a global financial distributor - to help individuals and families become financially independent. We look forward to working with the Canadian Curling Association and the World Curling Federation to make this a very successful event.”

What’s our point? Simply that curling team sponsors can grow from “smaller” industry contributors into larger national partners; from issuing grassroots, slap-on-the-back support to cutting some very big cheques. And this new reality is something that curling sales experts used to scoff at.

They’d best not be scoffin any more. World Financial Group now joins The Dominion and M&M Meat Shops as major players in the CCA Season of Champions stable, and all three started the same way... as lowly curling team sponsors.

The revolution continues.

Rockin' the Gold Curling

Rockin’ the Gold is a fundraising event to support the Canadian Curling Association’s ongoing quest to encourage and develop the sport across Canada.

Sounds good to us!

On July 17, participants will gather to compete and have fun at Toronto’s High Park Curling Club for the Rockin’ the Gold Bonspiel ($80 per team includes three indoor games, door prize ticket, plus dinner and drink) while guests/attendees can also drop by (at $10 a ticket) to enjoy the fun.

Waitaminute... did we say “indoor”?

Yep, we’re talking about the dryland version of the sport, “Kurling”, which is sweeping across Canada after originating in the U.K.

The “stones” are used in the Capital One Rocks & Rings program (you remember this story, and this one, right?)

This interesting day is organized by Sport and Event Marketing students from Toronto’s George Brown College, each of whom is a self-declared curling enthusiast.

Partners include the CCA (of course), George Brown College (of course), Wellington Brewery, Boston Pizza, Generation Go and Rock Solid Productions.

Sounds like there may be a couple of team spots available, so hustle on over to the website. You can also follow the action on Facebook (must be a member) and on Twitter.


What else?

• World wheelchair curling champion skip Jim Armstrong looked simply fabulous on Canada Day (see second photo, below the first)... but the serious news is that he has a shoulder injury that will require surgery. And thus brings the big question: does he go ahead with surgery now, or tough it out until after the 2010 Paralympics in March?

The story is here, with over 20 comments so far ...

• Still with wheelies and Vancouver, 2006 Paralympic champion skip Chris Daw is relocating, again, this time from Newfoundland all the way across Canada to the left coast. Daw has been hired as the new General Manager of the Vancouver Curling Club, which of course will be moving into its new digs just 100 yards away within a year or so following the Olympics and Paralympics.

Apparently, Daw will also be continuing his work for the CCA as the Development Coordinator for Wheelchair Curling (under the Discover Curling program).

This is all good news, considering Daw was tempted to leave the country just a few years ago.

Oh... Daw will also be a father, again... he and wife Morgan are expecting a child in early March, 2010. Congrats Chris, on numerous fronts!

• DID YOU KNOW: that venue construction for the Sochi 2014 Olympics is definitely underway?

• Wanna buy a curling book? You can get “Saskatchewan Curling: Heartland tradition 1882-1990” for 10 bucks ...

• And finally, welcome to a new curling blogger, who describes himself or herself as an Average U.S. Curler. No pressure now, having been linked by The Curling News Blog ... :)

Banner year for Canadian curling governance

Exactly one year ago today, we posted this story on the first Canadian Curling Association NCC (National Curling Congress) helmed by new CEO Greg Stremlaw.

Another Congress has now come and gone, and today’s news release reveals that another $880,000 surplus has been committed to the long-term reserve fund.

“Financial performance is the item that stands out,” said Stremlaw, in an interview with The Curling News.

“This puts us at $1.7 million in accumulated surplus.”

Indeed, as the CCA newser mentions, a Senior Program Officer with Sport Canada noted that the CCA’s financial performance has been particularly outstanding and that some of the results are hard to believe, given where the organization was only a few short years ago.

There were tons of interesting presentations, workshops, breakout sessions, discussions and notices of motion throughout the week. Items catching our keen TCN eye include:

• a new “Curling For Life” document, which closely examines the “paradigm shift” between curling as a lifetime recreational sport and curling as a high-performance athletic endeavour;

• an embracing of new social marketing efforts, from Facebook to Blogger to Twitter and whatever techno-stuff is still to come;

• plans to “Leverage 2010” and thus ensure that curling clubs are prepared for an expected avalanche of phone calls, walk-ins and other outreach from the general public during February’s Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games;

• an “investigation of the possibility of establishing” a Canadian Mixed Doubles Championship;

• implementation of a single competitor’s fee, starting in 2010-11, that will allow competitors to enter all disciplines which require the payment of a fee;

• a Member Association code of conduct, that will be developed for presentation and approval at the 2010 National Curling Congress.

In terms of elections, 2008-09 volunteer boss Fran Todd of Ontario (CCA photo above) has been replaced by her former Vice-Chair, Graham Prouse of Grande Prairie, Alberta, who now serves as Chair of the Board of Governors. Jack Bowman (Victoria, B.C.) is the new Vice-Chair.

CCA Governors Lew Andrews (St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador) and Beth Sullivan (Bathurst, New Brunswick) have retired from the Board, while three newcomers are on board: Elaine de Ryk of Greenfield Park, Quebec, Ron Hutton of Saint John, New Brunswick and Georgina Granchelli of Sydney, Nova Scotia.

For his part, Stremlaw seems pumped about just how smoothly the curling landscape is rolling out before him.

“I am personally witnessing a collaborative spirit with the stakeholders,” said Stremlaw.

“Truth be told, it hasn’t always been this way. At times the sport can become political.

“We’ve got 14 member associations and they’re all diverse, all different, but there seems to be a genuine interest in working together, getting ourselves to where we want to go.”


Anything else, you ask?

• CCA Governor and longtime curling leader Bernadette McIntyre does have other interests besides the Roaring Game... such as her very cool job ...

• Monsanto Canada has renewed its sponsorship agreements with CCA through to 2013. The news release indicates that the Continental Cup, which will not be contested in the upcoming Olympic season, will return for another run of events from 2011, 2012 and 2013 ...

• Monsanto, of course, also supports western-based curling clubs through the “A Better House” grant program, which disbursed some $80,000 in funding directly to prairie clubs this past season ...

• Another curling mover and shaker has taken a step back from the sport. Fast Eddie Lukowich, the former Brier and world champion skip, has resigned his position with the United States Curling Association after nearly 10 years, and just eight months prior to Vancouver 2010. Canwest has the story here ...

• Winnipeg’s Jill Officer made a recent appearance in Thunder Bay, Ont. on behalf of Olympic sponsor RBC ...

• World Senior men’s champion skip Eugene Hritzuk is on the air via The Curling Show ...

• And finally, this brief YouTube video asks the question “What’s curling all about?”
Well, gee, didn’t you know the answer...?

More athlete scrutiny: ice marks

TORONTO (Not Calgary Again) – More whispers abound, this time that the CCA is looking closely at what curling countries are doing about the new World Curling Federation rule regarding athlete “damage” to the ice surface.

The rule came out in the fall – highlighting a three-step disciplinary process for said damage – and Scotland, for one, jumped on it immediately.

That’s right, folks. The final step in the process is heavy: player expulsion from the game!

There are also reports that the CCA has quietly spoken to certain athletes (and they have been doing so throughout the season) about their own chances – or likelihood, barring changes to personal tendencies – of being nabbed in this web.

It’s a web which gets spun very seriously a little over a week from now in Gangneung, Korea at the Mount Titlis World Women’s Championship and then next month at the 50th anniversary Ford World Men’s in Moncton.

The above funny photo (by Anil Mungal, of course, courtesy of Capital One) is from the fall Tour season, and is light in tone.

But John Morris took some serious flak at last year’s Brier – and the one before that – regarding knee and hand prints on the ice and to be perfectly fair, he “didn’t do anything different than (he’d) been doing all year.”

Check out some of the players in Calgary after they’ve released their stones, or as they sweep, particularly with dual grippers on their shoes.

As the worlds draw closer, have you noticed any differences?

Curling Rocks & Rings

We’ve got stuff on the Ontario men’s Tankard, Brazil, Teams of the Year nods, the Jolly Grain Giant and more, but first ...

The new school curling program Rocks and Rings was launched Monday morning at Toronto’s Thorncliffe Park, merely the largest elementary school in North America with a stunning 1,900 students.

Attendees included Ontario Minister of Education Kathleen Wynne, chief sponsor Ian Cunningham of Capital One, Greg Stremlaw and Fran Todd of the Canadian Curling Association, Leigh Armstrong from associate sponsor The Dominion of Canada, representatives from the Ontario Curling Association, various media (including The Curling News), ace curling photog Anil Mungal (image above) and even a film crew from TSN.

But the real stars of the show were the kids... but of course. The program instructors had them bouncing off the walls with excitement, even standing in a special circle to do their “happy dance” when they managed to draw the rings. We particularly liked the session where a small army of kids, each clutching a pint-sized brush, responded to green (“Hurry”) and red (“Whoa”) flashcards shaped like a stop sign.

It was wild, and noisy, and the purpose is crystal clear: get kids moving, and give them an introduction to curling they might not otherwise receive.

“For years, curling has been under-represented in large urban markets and inner-city jurisdictions,” said Stremlaw.

“This program goes after the root of this problem by allowing the sport of curling to be exposed to school children throughout the Greater Toronto Area and, in due course, other major urban centres.”

It was great fun to see all the formal speakers address the children, who sat cross-legged in front of the podium before they engaged in their “gym floor” curling sessions.

“There’s a guy who works in our office who loves to curl,” Minister Wynn quipped to the kids. “I think he would rather curl than come to work.”

That fellow, who was present, is Ken Thurston, a Senior Policy Advisor to the minister who has curled for no less than 40 years.

“Watching the students made it evident that Rocks and Rings is a fun and motivational way to build physical activity into daily routines,” said Thurston.

“The equipment is fairly simple, but the potential is great. I see this as a great way to get more volunteers into our schools – including parents, grandparents and community members who are fellow curling enthusiasts.”

Rocks and Rings maestro Chad McMullan was there too – of course – and said there has been great response to the program, which targets 30 schools in the greater Toronto area (GTA) through the remainder of the curling season.

“The kids and teachers absolutely love it and all the while we help address several of the challenges the sport faces,” said McMullan.

“We’ve had requests from schools and instructors in Vancouver, Kelowna, London, Halifax, Ottawa, the list goes on.”

After the launch, McMullan drove straight to Woodstock in time for his first match at the Ontario TSC Stores Tankard. And speaking of Woodstock, here cometh the links ...


• Here’s Tankard competitor Peter Steski with a zinger about his Brier-competitor grandfather, the legendary Rudy Steski. And we thought Peteski saves his best stuff for TSN’s Off The Record!

Speaking of Steski, the team that is actually now skipped by Heath McCormick held a 6-2 lead over Rob Lobel in Monday night’s seventh end... whereupon the Lobel brothers scored two, stole four in the eighth, dropped a deuce in the ninth and then scored another four coming home. That’s a surrender of 10 points in three of the last four ends for an epic 12-8 loss and an 0-2 start (McCormick is now 1-2). Yoinks.

Meanwhile, Glenn Howard ran into a Joe Frans roadblock last night but, hey, all is not lost... Howard is still leading his local Midland Major League, and if we remember correctly, that’s the one where he plays with his wife and both Wayne and Sherry Middaugh ...

Hey... where’s Pat Ryan? Well, given the initial flurry of excitement over a possible Ryan appearance this week, we must point out that this chance is now remote, seeing that Peter Corner welcomed his second child into the world last week.

By the way, you can also follow the Tankard action via this blog and also a photo gallery... geez, nice broom bag, Savs ...

• Speaking of Sherry, it’s bad enough she made an early exit at last week’s Ontario STOH... but couldn’t her own hometown newspaper find a better photo of her? Sheesh ...

• New Brunswick youngster Andrea Kelly is back in the Scotties show, after a 5-4 win over an even younger Mary Jane McGuire in the provincial final... and play is finally underway in Manitoba to declare the final STOH team for Victoria ...

• All we’ve seen from Brazilian media so far is this columnist’s blog page, which does have 14 comments posted to it. The World Curling Federation has a summary report here, plus a photo from the action. The story goes on to tell the tale of the teams that have qualified for the U.S. Olympic Team Trials in Colorado in a couple of weeks, and one big name that’s missing is Pete Fenson ...

• Speaking of the WCF, a couple of weeks after their story on the death of legendary curling builder Elizabeth Paterson-Brown, this piece has now appeared in Edinburgh’s Evening News ...

• Here’s another fellow – U.S. sports marketing pundit Joe Favorito – who approves of USA Curling’s recent promotional efforts ...

• DID YOU KNOW: that the Saskatchewan men start today, and the Jolly Grain Giant is trying to turn back the clock? And that Newfoundland and Labrador, featuring Brad Gushue, started yesterday ...?

• Remember the Yukon’s Orest Peech? Well, his 0-11 record at the 1999 Brier actually did him some good, once ...

• In this story on the Vancouver 2010 curling legacy, the CCA’s Warren Hansen grumps about the 10,000-seat permanent venue that eventually became a 6,000-seat “multi-purpose community recreation centre” ...

• Canada’s double world champions – Kevin Martin and Jennifer Jones – are both up for Team of the Year honours at the upcoming Canadian Sport Awards ...

• mandy is raving about the illustrious language of curling, which includes her own impressive linguistics on the sport’s “enthusiastic stick-to-it-ive verve” and, of course, “the icy cool in your loins” ...

• And finally... Happy Birthday Bob!

Curling.ca Revamped

The Canadian Curling Association has a revamped website.

As first glance will tell you, it is now very, very busy... some may even complain it almost overwhelms the senses. But if the mission is to bombard the viewer with as much curling content as possible, they have succeeded, and all that remains is to see if they can maintain the intensity throughout this critical pre-Olympic curling season.

Speaking of the critical pre-Olympic curling season, the oft-maligned CTRS Trials process has its own button, with no less than five descriptive sub-pages. Will this effort finally halt the quizzical stares shared coast to coast... or will they actually increase?

Of interest is the current top news story, scalped from yesterday’s St. John’s Telegram – with full credit, of course. There was a day when the only “news” fit to appear on curling.ca was that of the org’s own news releases. Could this story, which highlights a Canadian team’s upcoming appearance in a clearly non-CCA event halfway around the world, signal a new era of news dissemination?

Of great interest is the new commitment, by staff, to the blogosphere. Warren Hansen’s The Last End, a fixture in CCA publications since the days of black-and-white printing presses, is now online, as are blogs from National Development Coach Paul Webster, located here, and Event and Curling Club Development man Danny Lamoureux, located here.

Will The Boss eventually have a blog?

And we guess we won’t be, er, borrowing any CCA talent for blogposts here at The Curling News, eh?

We also note a tighter relationship between this relaunched site and that of the Season of Champions event site, which leads off with a much bigger splash for their Canadian-hosted events.

All in all, a solid revamp of what is still, after all these years, an important site for the promotion of the sport. After all, the CCA website still comes up No. 1 on a Google search of “curling”, ahead of – in order – Wikipedia, the TSN curling page, the horrible, awful dog’s breakfast which is, sadly, curling.com (no link provided) and even the World Curling Federation.


Elsewhere:

• revRecluse continues to unearth – and play with – great curling board games from days gone by. His latest is a glorious Hubley from the 1960s, featuring a delicious concave playing surface ...

• The Bismark Summer Spiel featured a wheelchair curling team for the first time, and there’s video here ...

• Finally, this doesn’t read merely “irreverent” to us. In fact, this sure reads like a rip. Curling compared to... competitive eating? If you agree with our sourness and wish to direct some venom, do so to Flairview Travel Pty Ltd., 680 George Street, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, 2000. Telephone is either (02) 8263 5100 or +612.82635151, we can’t tell which. Perhaps SuperBacon can find us an email address? ...

A time for athletes?

Congratulations to one-half of the mighty online curling portal CurlingZone on his marriage over the weekend. Gerry Geurts, pictured here with Marie the day before their big plunge, is not only the co-founder of CurlingZone... he also steers the Ontario Curling Tour, co-publishes The Black Book of Curling, liases with CBC-TV on their Grand Slam coverage, writes code like a Russian spy, and has a truly awful in-turn.

He’s also a cancer survivor.

All the best to Gerry and Marie, currently on honeymoon in the Dominican Republic. And thanks to CZ’s other half, Dallas Bittle, for the photo.

In other news, the Canadian Curling Association’s annual Congress/AGM is over and there’s some loose ends to tie up. We’ll be delving into the details and what they mean in the coming weeks and months – no rush, eh – but for now...

The new board faces are Saskatchewan’s Bernadette McIntyre and Manitoba’s Mitch Tarapasky, and the president and vice-president both hail from New Brunswick: Al Forsythe is in command with Beth Sullivan the next-in-line. When one considers that World Curling Federation prez Les Harrison hails from Moncton, it sure looks like New Brunswick is the new epicentre of curling power.

Meanwhile, with the new board still dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s on the financial situation, the other big news is a new era of cooperation and determination dawning amongst the traditionally über-political staff/board/membership dynamic.

Such a stage was built well in advance of the Congress with the release of the Report of the Joint Working Committee on Governance and Organizational Structure, a hefty proposal for a new era of CCA governance, which of course passed unanimously.

There are two things that leap out immediately, however. How is it that an impressive 64-page template for change does not address the issue of single-year terms for the CCA president? We’ve always thought that one-year terms don’t do a heck of a lot for a boss – newly empowered by said JWC report, of course – who is often just starting to feel comfortable in the high chair before he or she are headed out the door. We’re not suggesting decades of power like this guy or that guy, but given the six-year terms for the board of directors, a switch to a two-year presidential term only makes sense. Or does it not?

And finally, how is it that the missing equation in the CCA’s leadership conundrum – CEO/staff, board and member associations – continues to be athletes? Was this governance review not the perfect opportunity to finally get on with what simply must happen, as it has already in so many other sports... namely, athlete representation to the board of directors?