A Book & A Movie

For those who read my blogs regularly, and thank you for that, as you can see the posts are not coming at you at the rate they once were. There's two reasons for that.

It is, finally, the end of a long curling season and two, for those of you who visit Facebook will know, I have purchased a home (see photo) on the south end of Lake Cowichan about 1.5 hours north of Victoria. One of my lake neighbours is Elaine Dagg-Jackson (although she and husband Glen are only summer residents and are at the north end of the lake [I can hear her now, "There goes the neighbourhood"]). Now that the move in process is winding down, I've been able to put feet up and get caught up on some reading and watching a movie that has been on my "must see" list for a few months. I don't make it a habit of foisting my likes and dislikes upon others and as a result, I'm not one for saying, "Heh, I read this book or I saw this movie and you just have to read it and see it!". Well, in light of what I've just said, you do have to read "The Gold Mine Effect" and see, if you haven't already, "Seven Days in Utopia"! First, the book.

"The Gold Mine Effect" is the work of author Rasmus Ankersen, a Danish footballer whose professional career was stopped before it got started due to injury. When his elite football (soccer for those reading in NA) was over, he turned to trying to solve a mystery in the world of sports, notably why pockets of the world were producing world class athletes at a disproportionate rate. Why does a track & field club in Jamaica with no running track, save a grass oval, produce so many elite sprinters? And why do two towns, one in Kenya and the other in Ethiopia, produce so many of the world's great middle and long distance runners (it's not genes nor topography)? What's happening in Russia and Korea to spin out so many highly skills female athletes in tennis and golf respectively? And what's with the coaches (author Ankersen calls them "godfathers") in these "gold mines" that none played the sport they now coach? Ankersen wanted to know what the secret was in these gold mines. You'll be surprised to learn the secret (hint, there actually isn't one)!

Those of us in North America (athletes & coaches) are going to have our core beliefs sorely tested by what Ankersen uncovers (better tighten that chin strap once again)!!!

"Seven Days in Utopia" is the story of a golfer (Luke Chisolm [played by Lucas Black]) who, after a disastrous first outing on the pro tour lost his skill set, or at least he thought he did until, quite unexpectedly he wound up in a Texas town, population 373, called "Utopia" and met up with "Johnny Crawford" (played by Robert Duvall) who demonstrated that his skills had not vanished. But how Johnny Crawford did it will, quite frankly put a chill up your spine and make your hair stand on end. It's one of those "feel good" movies that seem so rare today. Warning; there's no sex, violence or computer animation! It's about the human spirit and how we "think" makes us what we "are"! You'll find out why the young golfer, Lucas, puts S-F-T on his golf balls.

There is a surprise ending, at least an ending that will make you wonder, "Did he make the putt?" and lead you to a web site for the answer. For coaches, it shows us that there are many more ways to help athletes than by taking them to the sport specific venue for some intensive, coach-directed training. But enough said, enjoy the movie. You'll not see the world quite the same again!

THE GOLD MINE EFFECT - Rasmus Ankersen ISBN 978-1-44342-057-0

SEVEN DAYS IN UTOPIA (available on iTunes & Google Play to buy or rent) starring Robert Duvall

The Latest On Why Curling Stones Curl

May 13, 2013 — Researchers from Uppsala University in Sweden can now reveal the mechanism behind the curved path of a curling stone. The discovery by the researchers, who usually study friction and wear in industrial and technical applications, is now published in the scientific journal Wear.

In the curling sport, the players shoot their stones along the ice so that they slowly slide towards the target area, almost 30 m away. The game has its name from the slightly curved "curled" path taken by the stone, when released with a slow rotation. This curled path is important since it is used to reach open spots behind previously played stones, or take out opponent stones behind hindering "guarding" stones. As soon as the player releases the stone, it is only affected by the friction against the ice. The friction can be slightly reduced, and therefore the sliding distance somewhat increased by intensively sweeping the ice just in front of the sliding stone.

If the player gives the stone a clockwise rotation as it is released, it curls to the right, while an anti clockwise rotating stone will curl to the left. The stone is heavy, almost 20 kg, and the rotation is very slow, typically 2-3 rotations during the roughly 25 seconds it takes to slide to the target. This is much too slow to cause the curved path taken by the ball in sports such as table tennis, tennis or soccer.

Despite years of speculations among the curlers and several scientific articles, so far no one has been able to present a good explanation to why the curling stones actually curl; "What puts the curl in the curling stone?." Interestingly, other rotating objects sliding over a surface curl in the opposite direction (make a simple test by sliding for example a glass turned upside down over a slippery floor).

However, the mechanism has now been revealed by researchers at Uppsala University in Sweden. Harald Nyberg, Sara Alfredsson, Sture Hogmark and Staffan Jacobson, who usually study friction and wear in technical and industrial material systems, describe in their article that the curved path is due to the microscopic roughness of the stone producing microscopic scratches in the ice sheet. As the stone slides over the ice the roughness on its leading half will produce small scratches in the ice. The rotation of the stone will give the scratches a slight deviation from the sliding direction. When the rough protrusions on the trailing half shortly pass the same area, they will cross the scratches from the front in a small angle. When crossing these scratches they will have a tendency to follow them. It is this scratch-guiding or track steering mechanism that generate the sideway force necessary to cause the curl.

The importance of having a proper roughness of the sliding surface on the stone to give it he expected trajectory, is since long known among curlers. However, this has not previously been coupled to the steering mechanism. While working on their model the Uppsala researchers experimented with pre-scratching of the ice in various ways, and could then observe that also non-rotating stones could be guided. Stones with very smooth, polished sliding surface were however not affected by the scratches. They also investigated the microscopic scratches made by the stones by moulding replicas of the ice, that were subsequently studied in microscopes.

Journal Reference:

1. Harald Nyberg, Sara Alfredson, Sture Hogmark, Staffan Jacobson. The asymmetrical friction mechanism that puts the curl in the curlingstone. Wear, 2013; DOI:10.1016/j.wear.2013.01.051

Golden Hawks High Performance Centre

We're quickly approaching that time of year when one's high school career enters the rear view mirror phase. And what a time it is, graduation ceremony, prom, parties ....! I hope all you high school grads had the same mentorship I had when I was about to enter high school in my hometown of Kitchener-Waterloo, ON. His name was Leroy (Lee) Hallman, one of our boy scout troop leaders, family friend and high school teacher at, ahem, another secondary institution in K-W (our great rival). I remember the moment well.

We were on a canoe trip in Ontario's Algonquin Provincial Park. And as stated above, it was the summer before starting high school. Lee and I were at the water's edge "shooting the breeze" when the subject morphed into my pending high school career and what it might bring. That prompted Lee to say, "Bill, your high school days will be among the best days of your life!" As usual, Lee was right! He justified his statement by saying, "You will have the best balance of independence, resources and responsibility. You will have more independence and more resources later in life but those will be balanced off by much greater responsibility. Enjoy your high school days!"

Little did I know at the time that following my formal education, I would spend about 30 years, teaching middle school students and passing along to them, Lee's words of wisdom. As you can see, this post is for all high school graduating students, but with a twist not available to me at that time beside Canoe Lake.

If you're looking for a post secondary institution with a superb curling training programme, you would do well to consider Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, ON. The excellent high performance programme about which I speak is the title of this post. It's under the direction of my friend Gary Crossley. Gary is ably assisted by Glenn Paulley, Maurice Wilson and David Kaun. It's located in what I consider to be my home curling facility, The Kitchener-Waterloo Granite Curling Club.

Curling, almost from the outset, has had strong "Little Rocks", bantam & junior programmes. The "gap" occurred most frequently at the post-secondary level. There was always the thought that the gap was the graveyard for much of the work that was done with and for young curlers. By the time they exited their post-secondary institution, thoughts turned to career and family more so than competitive curling. Oh, there were varsity curling programmes. I coached at the University of Waterloo from 1990-99 but despite my best efforts, I hesitate to say that I had a curling high performance programme.

Gary was a curler and world class track & field (now "athletics") coach at the international level. He was the National Team Head Coach specializing in women's hurdles. He had become accustomed to working with elite athletes. When he decided to go "all in" with curling, not surprisingly he did so with the same expertise and passion he had exhibited with athletics.

The next step was to find a location for his programme and to say the K-W Granite Curling Club stepped up to the plate would be putting it mildly. They embraced Gary's vision and became for all intents and purpose, partners in the venture and I'm pleased to say that partnership continues and flourishes. The K-WGCC has provided office & equipment space, a dedicated fitness facility which includes a TRX system, treadmill, elliptical trainer, workout mats and a variety of apparatus including medicine balls, rollers and skip ropes.

The next item on the agenda was support from existing individuals in the area of high performance training in curling and associations willing to share what they already had learned along that trail. A key individual was Jim Waite and the Canadian Curling Association provided Gary with all the help they could to get the programme off the ground.

Next was the affiliation with Wilfrid Laurier University and again, he found an enthusiastic ally. Gary was named varsity curling coach at WLU and with that came a group of talented, passionate and dedicated athletes. The main pieces of the puzzle were in place to allow Gary and his colleagues to "hang their shingle".

It soon became apparent that the LHPC was a goal-oriented centre with solid pedagogy and a vision. Soon other partners came on board, notably the WLU Kinesiology Dept., the Ontario Curling Association and some community based programmes who supplied staff.

From the outset the goals for the LHPC were;

• to serve as a technical resource to both coaches & athletes in every aspect of the sport of curling
• to offer a single location, with dedicated staffing, providing a full spectrum of resources & services to meet the needs of competitive teams
• to serve "anchor teams" (teams not affiliated withe either WLU or the KWGCC of which there were 7 in 2012)
• to provide services, in particular customized on-ice or off-ice team sessions
• to support mandates from the Ontario Curling Council, the Ontario Curling Association & the Canadian Curling Association through programme delivery, particularly in the areas of bantam & junior aged player development as outlined in the CCA's "Long Term Athlete Development model
• to build partnerships with other individuals, groups & agencies in the sport of curling that share the same vision of long term athlete development

During the season just concluded, the LHPC's offerings have expanded significantly and a number of successful teams &/or individuals athletes, including bantam-aged athletes, have taken advantage of the on-ice & off-ice services. The LHPC has conducted 3 public clinics at the KWGCC and another three week, six session clinic at the Galt (Cambridge) Curling Club and another this past February at the Elmira Curling Club (north of Waterloo in Mennonite country). The four clinics attracted in excess of 300 participants. In addition, the LHPC has conducted 15 anchor teams sessions and a weekend anchor team clinic, 13 non-anchor team sessions and 20 individual sessions. These sessions included both on-ice & off-ice sessions covering a  wide variety of topics including mental preparation, strategy & team dynamics.

Success soon followed. Twelve athletes (9 female & 3 male) played on various teams at the 2013 Ontario Provincial Junior Championships (including the champion male skip and the women's runner-up skip). Four female athletes earned a berth to the bantam provincial championships. Another four female athletes advanced to Senior Women's provincial play downs and 3 male athletes earned their second consecutive zone crest at the Fairfield Marriott Challenge.

In addition to the four regular staff members mentioned above, the LHPC has an ancillary staff of professionals on call in the areas of health & wellness, athletic therapy, chiropractic, massage therapy & reflexology, yoga and sport psychology.

Even though the Wilfrid Laurier University varsity curling programme trains at the same facility as the LHPC, the intent was never to use the LHPC as a recruiting vehicle for Laurier varsity athletes but rather it was hoped the centre could capitalize on the brand and success of the Laurier curling programme to bring credibility in its early stages. While Laurier athletes benefit from having the centre in the same facility, the LHPC offers its many services to a wide spectrum of athletes, from bantam and junior aged curlers in and around southern Ontario to varsity athletes at other post secondary institutions and to senior adult teams.

I'm guessing by this point in the post you can see how impressed I am with this programme for post-secondary aged athletes but I don't want anyone reading this to conclude that Wilfrid Laurier University is the only post-secondary institution with a high performance curling programme. There are others around the country, notably at the University of Alberta at the Saville Sports Centre in Edmonton under the direction of Robb Krepps.

When I get "home" to the Kitchener-Waterloo area to visit family and friends, I warn Gary of my arrival and most times he takes me up on my offer to do a presentation to the varsity athletes of both Waterloo universities (WLU and U of W). The are always attentive and make me feel  that I'm adding to the programmes at those institutions but in reality, they've likely already heard my words come from the skilled and experience coaches on site every day.

You can reach the LHPC in a variety of ways:
on the web: http://hawkscurlinghpc.ca
on Facebook: http://www.facebook, com/pages/Golden-Hawks-Curling-HPC/347187318641464
on Twitter: @hawkscurlinghpc
email: director@hawkscurlinghpc.ca
by phone: +1(519)897-2875
by mail: Gary Crossley, Director, Golden Hawks High Performance Centre, Kitchener-Waterloo Granite Curling Club, 99 Seagram Drive, Waterloo, ON, Canada, N2L 3B

Gary & Co. have absolutely no intention of resting on their laurels as plans are in the works to establish a provincial "La Releve" programme, designed to bridge the gap between the "Own the Podium" bantam project and the National La Releve programme.

So, graduating high school curlers, perhaps your chosen field of study CAN co-exist with a first class curling high performance programme. Consider the LHPC in Waterloo, ON. If you do find your way there in September, be sure to say "Hi" to Gary for me and another thing, those high school days will be among if not the best days of your life!

Mixed Doubles From An Athlete's Perspective

My guest blogger to day is Hans Frauenlob from New Zealand. Hans and I go back several years when he played on the National Men's Team for NZ. He and his teammates would stop into the National Training Centre in Calgary, AB en route to that year's World Men's Curling Championship for several days of training. In 2006 Hans and Co. wore the black and sliver of NZ at the Winter Olympic Games in Torino, Italy. 

Now that there are 50+ candles on his birthday cake, Hans is a competitor at the World Senior Curling Championships. This year in Fredericton, Hans skipped his NZ side to a very well-deserved silver medal and all the while, as you'll read below, competed in the World Mixed Doubles Curling Championships. More than once Hans was seen running from one ice surface to the next to compete in one or the other competitions. Hans put his fingers to keyboard to record his thoughts on Mixed Doubles from his very unique perspective.

I encourage you to comment on Hans' ideas for the future of MD. Many feel there's a real chance that MD might be another discipline in the Winter Olympic Games programme. 
BT

I recently had the honour of representing my country (with my teammate Natalie Campbell) at the 2013 World Mixed Doubles Curling Championships.  My congratulations and thanks go to Wayne Tallon and the team in Fredericton for running an absolute first-class event.

Mixed Doubles is a really interesting new format of the game. It's much more fun to play than fours. You're actively in every shot as a thrower, sweeper, line reader and strategist, and the situation can change massively from shot to shot. Things happen fast. You have to be fit! My thanks go to Natalie for introducing me to this great new form of the game!

Unfortunately, it is as boring as hell to watch as a live spectator. Fans at the arena don't really get involved in the game - they don't really know how yet. Strategic choices are limited, and as a result shot selection choices are limited as well. This deficiency must be fixed if our dream of seeing Mixed Doubles as a medal discipline at the Winter Olympics is to be realised. We have to get the fans involved with the game.

It all reminds me a lot of the days pre-Free Guard Zone. It's too predictable and repetitive. The doubles shot choices (especially the first one) are limited and obvious - and even great execution of the same shots over and over again can get boring (remember 2-1 games and eight ends of peeling guards?). Fortunately, like the FGZ, I believe a rule change could improve the spectacle.

I have a proposal that I believe could really improve doubles as live spectator sport, with the bonus of making it even more fun as a player. It involves opening up the scoring zone, and requiring more strategic choices to be made than need to be made right now.

I propose that the stationery stone of the team with the hammer be placed at the back of the four foot circle on the centre line, rather than at the back of the pin on the centre line (the current rule). I'd like to explain my proposal, and the reasons behind it.

Like many, I'm relatively new to doubles, but I've played fours for years. I've been fortunate enough to play in a lot of international events in arenas with live spectators.

In my experience, there are three main things that really 'light up' and engage a live curling crowd:

1. A big scoring shot with takeout weight
2. A lot of screaming and great sweeping (usually leading to a big scoring shot or an end-turning shot)
3. An opportunity to second-guess strategic options shot to shot

Unfortunately, Doubles suffers relative to fours in all of these areas. Let's examine why:

1. The big weight scoring shot

In fours, the 'big shot' is usually something like a double takeout, and after the shot is complete, it is immediately obvious to the crowd that the throwing team has scored a bundle. The crowd knows, and goes wild.

In doubles, the 'big shot' usually also involves some weight and repositioning some stones. However, when the shot is being delivered, there are almost always four or five stones in and around the four foot. So when the shot is over - its often not immediately obvious that the shot was successful. The area around the pin is so crowded it is usually only the player at the tee who actually knows who scored. So the chance for the crowd to immediately roar their approval for a great shot is lost - they just don't know what the result was!

2. A lot of screaming and great sweeping

Of the three areas, this is the one with the least difference between the disciplines. But there is just something different to someone sweeping alone to seeing a two person sweeping machine in full flight.

And when a draw shot in doubles needs both sweepers, no one is screaming line calls, so something is audibly missing from the shot for a spectator.

3. An opportunity to second-guess strategic options.

This is a big one.

A current, and legitimate, criticism of Doubles is that the same shots are played time after time. As a spectator in fours, the choice of the first shot of an end for the team without the hammer is a genuinely interesting choice. Draw into the rings? (trying for a force) Centre guard? (challenging - maybe trying for a steal!) Long centre guard? (wow interesting, maybe trying to stack two guards, gambling big for a steal!)

In doubles however, there is only one shot choice for the first rock of the end for the team without hammer. Every time, it is a freeze-tiny bump to the opponents stone placed at the back of the pin. This is usually followed by a series of small taps, bumps and freezes, and before long, the button area resembles a Los Angeles freeway at rush hour!

At this point, the fan in the stands has no idea at all what a 'good shot choice' would look like. This isn't because they don't have knowledge of the game.. its because they just can't see the stone positions and angles well enough to know what the options actually are! Its too busy in the button area!

The net result - there is little 'between shots' buzz in the crowd as everyone in the crowd plays skip and makes a shot choice for the player on the ice. I know that I've never missed a shot from the stands!

Taking this opportunity for input away from the crowd makes them less involved in the game.

Worse - it is lazy strategically. There is only 'one way' to start an end. This is bad for the game - there should be choices demanded of a team, and consequences to those choices.

I believe that there is a small adjustment to the rules of Mixed Doubles that could address all of these deficiency areas.

A Possible Solution

"Open up the scoring area, and also require the team without hammer to make a genuine shot choice, by positioning the stationary stone of the team with the hammer on the centre line at the back of the four foot circle".

This change would now require the team without the hammer to make a genuine shot choice! If the team is playing for a force, they might freeze the opponents shot in the back of the four foot - but the team with the hammer would still have the full button available. If the team is playing for a steal, they maybe try to bury biting the top button. The 'response shot' by the team with the hammer could then either 'commit the end' to the button area (by making a play to the stones in the four foot, which might guarantee a score of one but no more) or slightly open up the end by repositioning the stones a bit (which should leave two clear paths to the button and the four foot/button area 'more receptive' to hits or run-ins later in the end).

My belief is that this change would result in:

- slightly lower end scores (fewer 1s, 4s and 5s, more 2s and 3s)
- more hits to score multiple ends, with immediately clearer shot results for fans
- new strategies for the early shots of an end, serious strategic choices to be made, more reward for great execution, greater penalty for poor execution
- more shot options 'mid-end' (set up for a run-in/in-off? wedge another rock in there? split a stone top eight foot?)
- easier for fans to relate to what is happening on the ice

I would be really interested to hear what other curlers think of this idea. Doubles in the Olympics would be absolutely awesome for our sport - but if we can't engage the curling fan, we'll never get there.

Famous Last Words

Many have asked me what I say to teams about to play for a major curling prize like the recently concluded World Senior Curling Championships in Fredericton, NB. It's certainly a legitimate question and I do have a meeting with the teams prior to the "big game" to offer last words (the jury's out on just how "famous" they may or may not be). But before I reveal what I said to Teams Canada in Fredericton the night before the playoffs, let's examine the concept of coaches' words to athletes in general.

If you speak with any of the athletes who have been on teams I have coached, I hope they would tell you that I'm a "training & preparation" coach much more than a "game" coach. We won our two gold medals in the 12 months between the time Team King & Team Armitage won their respective national senior titles in Abbotsford, BC in March of 2012 and those playoff games on April 19 in the New Brunswick capital. They presented them on that date. We didn't win them on that date!

Some coaches are famous for their locker room speeches. Knute Rockne, football coach at Notre Dame is among the more well known in this category and I believe every elite coach has at one time or another inspired his/her team to greatness by words spoken just prior to the defining game. As my daughter Susan (the professional speaker) has told me on more than one occasion, "Dad, you can't motivate anyone. Motivation comes from within. You can only inspire people and you can do so in a variety of ways." With Susan as my guide, my brand of inspiration comes from example as much as anything. I can deliver the inspirational locker room speech, but I feel it's window dressing. A window through which elite athletes can easily see. No, I'm much more wanting to have the athletes so well prepared, any inspirational or motivational speeches are simply not necessary. My way of putting an exclamation point on this is to ask following a game, "Heh, how did you do?"

I mentioned to the teams along the way in Fredericton that in playoffs, teams sink to the level of their preparation. If there's a shred of truth to that, and I believe there's much more than just a shred, the more and better the training, the more likely the team will perform to its self-imposed expectations. A team that attempts to perform to external expectations, does so at its own peril!

When we landed in Fredericton, the players wanted to go to the Grant Harvey Centre to see the venue. When we arrived at the GHC, all the stories we had heard about the building were true. It was amazing! The two ice surfaces were spectacular with the WSCC on the larger ice surface but with fewer seats and the WMDCC on the smaller surface but with many more seats. I took a page out of the movie "Hoosiers" and mentioned to the teams that it appeared that the circles, especially the largest one was 12' in diameter with the others at 8', 4' and a button that looked very familiar. We knew all about the stones to be used so they seemed familiar as well. Then I added, "The stones and ice do not know this is the World Senior Curling Championships!"

I told both teams the first time I met them that I would play a diminishing role with them as the 2013 World Senior Curling Championships approached, to the point that when we actually arrived in Fredericton, their need of me was very small. In my mind had I not been able to attend at all due to some last minute unforeseen reason, the teams would know exactly what to do and how to do it. That's the utopia of coaching. It's unlikely to ever happen and it didn't in this case.

Despite our detailed preparation, there was something that happened with one of the teams during the event that had a coach not been there to act upon it, the result might have been very different. And I credit the team's fifth player for alerting me to the situation in the first place. Without that team member's keen sense of the team's dynamics, I would never have known about it. But when I learned of it, I knew exactly what to do!

I know I'm being vague here. I'm doing so to remain true to the trust the teams I've coached have in me that whatever I learn from the experience of working with them will be passed on generically. My role as coach is simple. It's to empower the athletes and ultimately the team. This is a good time to reveal one of the things I said to the teams at the hotel the night before the playoff day, "Tomorrow is your day. It's why you did all those things in the past 12 months. You don't need me any longer. You know what to do so just do what you know!"

Athletes try hard to perform. It's one of the best parts of the world of sports. It's why I like working with elite athletes in particular. They are goal driven people who will do whatever it takes to be the best they can be when it matters most. In society, people with this philosophy drive the world forward. They are part of the world's solutions, not the world's problems in most cases. But the desire to excel in crucial situations can be as much a liability as an asset.

The sport of curling is one in which you can try too hard. To perform well, one has to "stay within him/herself"!  A linebacker in N. A. style football cannot try too hard. Asking a curler to deliver a stone to an exact location over 100' away requires a calmness that football linebacker would not recognize. Which leads to the second of three points I made with the teams in that Delta Hotel room the night before the playoff games, "There's always the tendency to feel you have to do more to help the team be successful tomorrow. Don't fall for that trap. Actually, do less, but do it better than you've ever done it before! You have a job to do on the team that's different from each of your teammates. Just do your job and the team will be greater than the sum of its parts!"

Then there's that "maple leaf" emblazoned on the uniform. What an honour it is to wear the country's colours at an international event! For virtually all Canadian curlers it's a dream come true. I know for many of the athletes I have the honour of accompanying to the WSCC, a Canada shirt will go to a grandchild, for some within a day or two of the athlete's arrival home. And that leads to the last thing I said to the teams, "The only people who will matter tomorrow are your teammates. The over one million Canadians who curl don't matter. The Canadians in the stands watching you play don't matter. Your clubmates back in Edmonton & Red Deer don't matter. Your friends & family don't matter and most of all, I don't matter. The only ones who do, are your teammates. Do everything you can tomorrow to be the best teammate possible"!

It's been said that sports is one thing in life about which one can be truly passionate that doesn't make a hill of beans difference in the world. It's just a game.

On my flight home to Vancouver Island I had the good fortune of a 3+ hour layover in Toronto. My son Mark, his wife Emily and grandson Lucas met me for dinner at a restaurant near Pearson Airport. I had my two gold medals with me. I never took them out of my pocket. They weren't important. What was important was the time spent with them. And the most important words spoken by me were, "I love you (especially that little blonde kid)!"

The Fortune Cookie

When Teams Canada arrived in Fredericton, NB for the World Senior Curling Championships, Chris Jurgenson (5th for Team King) et moi were the last to arrive. A text message received as we waited for our bags to appear on the luggage carousel at the Fredericton Airport told us that the remainder of the Canadians were at the Diplomat Restaurant beside the Delta Hotel, our "home" for the next 12 days.

After dropping our luggage into our rooms, Chris & I headed straight to the restaurant. It was hugs all around to finally, after 12+ months of preparation, be at the site of the WSCC and only days away from "getting it on"!

Although most of the team had already eaten, Chris & I decided to order some food. For my part, to make the process easier & quicker, I opted for the restaurant's signature Chinese buffet complete with the ever present fortune cookie. As a group of ten, we then made our way to the Delta to finalize our pre-event training plans.

An integral part of those plans was a few days of training at the nearby Capital Winter Club where we had made arrangements to use their ice surfaces for "two-a-days", one at 1000 & again at 1700. Some of the other participating countries also availed themselves of this opportunity to train prior to the start of the WSCC or its companion event, the World Mixed Doubles Curling Championship. It was great to meet athletes from other countries!

Friday, April 12 was the Pre-event Training Day for all teams. This is standard operating procedure at major curling events whereby teams have a set amount of time to train on each of the sheets to be used in the event. Teams Canada had rehearsed the pre-event  training format to maximize the time available.

It was on that day that I saw one particular team on the men's side of the event that made me recall a similar time at last years WSCC in Copenhagen, Denmark. One team exhibited body language which screamed that they were the most talented curlers at the event therefore the final outcome was a foregone conclusion. In Copenhagen I recall whispering to one of the Team Canada athletes that to me that team's body language foreshadowed a very different story. I leaned in and stated, "Look at them. Not only will they not win, they won't even make the playoffs"! I did the same thing this year. I'm not an I-told-you-so person, but the truth is that neither team made the playoffs. They both arrived with the wrong "attitude" and if you have followed these posts you know how I feel about attitude! It won't come as a surprise when I tell you that the Canadians "just couldn't wait to play"! And did they play!

The venue for the WSCC & WMDCC was the sparkling new "Grant Harevey Centre" on the outskirts of Fredericton, NB. The building, housing two ice surfaces, was named in honour of two of Fredericton's favourite sons, both former NHL players, Danny Grant & the late Buster Harvey. The two ice surfaces were separated on two levels by change rooms on the lower and meeting rooms on the upper. One of those large rooms served as the "patch" and allowed spectators to freely move between the two competitions.

The local organizing committee under the leadership of Wayne Tallon, did an outstanding job hosting these world curling events! Nearly 400 volunteers met our every need and did so with a friendly smile. To Wayne, his committees and volunteers, THANK YOU! You are the gold standard for future WSCC & WMDCC events. I hope the two representatives from Dumfries, Scotland, site of the 2014 WSCC & WMDCC were paying attention. Interestingly enough, Wayne Tallon will be skipping Team Canada in Dumfries next April.

The WSCC & the WMDCC are different from the WCF events for men & women (held this year in Riga, Latvia & Victoria, BC) in that any member of the WCF may be represented. That means that if every member did send a team, there would be 50. Well, there weren't 50 but on the WSCC side of the ledger, there were 14 women's teams in two pools of seven and twenty men's teams in two pools of 10. It meant that Team Cathy King (with third Carolyn Morris, second Lesley McEwan, lead Doreen Gares & alternate Chris Jurgenson) played six round robin games while Team Rob Armitage (with third Keith Glover, second Randy Ponich, lead Wilf Edgar & alternate Lyle Treiber) faced 9 round robin opponents.

Playoffs are simple  with two semi-finals & final with the semi-final opponent coming from the other pool in a 1st v 2nd format. In other words, 1st from one pool played the 2nd place team in the other pool. For us it meant Team King would tangle with the ladies from Sweden and the men would battle the Swiss.

There were two aspects of these semi-final encounters worthy of note. The Swedish women's team was not a senior team, they were a "masters" team. I believe the youngest member was 62 but don't let chronology get in the way of excellence. These ladies were on their 10th trip to the WSCC! Tenth! They've been there before, know what's around every corner and have at least one world title to their name. On the men's side, the Swiss men chose to forego an opportunity to train on the ice surface that had been used all week for the WMDCC. That decision meant they would play with stones on an ice surface they were seeing for the first time. I don't make a habit out of second guessing my coaching colleagues but wow, for the sake of another hour in bed to not train, well, as I said at the time, "Let's not judge until our game with them is over. It might be a brilliant decision!" Ummm, no! The game was not close, and over in the required 6 ends. So, Team Armitage knew it was off to the final later that day.

The women from Edmonton, got their money's worth from the Swedish women and had to win it in the extra end on an open draw to the 8'. But the last end of regulation could have gone very differently. Down one with last stone advantage, Sweden had the only two stones in the house on opposite sides and Cathy had already played her first stone in the end. Two hit-and-stay shots by Sweden and the Canadian women's 50 game win streak at the WSCC would end and we'd have been playing for bronze. But skip Meldahl hit and rolled out. King made her hit and stay leaving an open draw to the full 12' for the tie to extend the game to an extra end. You already know that it did indeed go to the extra end but it was not due to a pretty easy draw. The Swedish skip chose to hit a Canadian stone biting the top 12' at about 1 o'clock and she chose the outside-in rotation. Yikes! She hit the stone, rolled to the edge of the 12' and only a "spin back" to win the measure forced the extra end which the Canadian quartet executed extremely well and, well, you know the result.

The gold medal games were solid efforts by the players wearing the maple leaf. The opposition for Team King was provided by Austria, the surprise semi-final winner over Scotland. With a score of 6 in the first end for Canada, the Austrians knew it was going to be uphill all the way. They finally shook hands with the Canadians at the end of six. One gold won with one to go!

The Red Deer Alberta foursome had a legitimate contender in the Kiwis. I happened to have coached three of them in an earlier life and knew them well. They could play and were the only other undefeated men's team. Skip Armitage formulated a game plan based upon the fact that the New Zealand skip had burned the candle at both ends, playing in the WSCC and the WMDCC. Rob felt that  NZ skip Hans Frauenlob had played so many draws to the 4', he might use that against him. Well, whatever the plan was, a score of 3 in the 6th end sealed the deal for the Albertans.

It was gold in stereo for Canada. "O Canada" never sounded so good to ten very well prepared, talented and dedicated senior curlers. I detected a tear or two on the cheeks of the men from Red Deer. Men who very likely can't recall the last time that happened and good for them!

Those tears and the hugs from the athletes were my reward!

When asked by people how it is to coach gold medalists at the world level, I explain that it's really complicated. You get two very talented, hard working and dedicated teams, then you stay out of the way!

And oh yes, that fortune cookie, it read, "You will soon be awarded in public." I'd also provide the ever-present lottery numbers but I'm going to play them myself, something I don't do. If the next post comes from the Bahamas, you'll know that fortune cookie really was golden.

It's Just The Beginning I'm Afraid

Canadian curling fans have seen the future at this year's men's & women's world curling championships and it's going to be the 1970's in ice hockey all over again. In that era, the Soviet Union iced hockey teams which were comprised of Red Army "soldiers" whose only real weapon was a hockey stick. For those much too young to know where this is headed, allow me to educate you with some international athletic history.

It was the "cold war" era. The space race was in full forward. Cultures were viewed in juxtaposition. Political systems clashed. Weapons of mass destruction were trained upon the principals with full intentions to deploy. In the midst of all of this tension, a game, played on ice, seem to be the battleground were the differences were to be settled. But, the ice surface was not level. The soviet national team was comprised of men who were listed as amateurs (occupation - soldier in the Soviet Red Army). Canada's national team was comprised of players who played for teams that battled for the Allan Cup, emblematic of senior hockey supremacy in Canada. On their team roster, under occupation you saw car salesman, real estate representative, fuel station attendant, electrician, postal worker, plumber, educator, computer technician etc.

The Russian National Team trained and played full time. Canada was represented at world championships and Winter Olympic Games by club teams, one, on two occasions, from my hometown of Kitchener (Kitchcner-Waterloo Dutchmen). It soon became evident that the Russian players, skilled as they were and they were very skilled, had a distinct advantage and rarely was the soviet hockey machine tested as it won international event after international event. It was in no way, Canada's best against the Soviet's best. I have used the words Russian and Soviet interchangeably thus far in this post but that was not true. Russia was a country in the Union of  Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), which really meant that on top of their "professionalism" they were drawing from several countries which now represent themselves internationally.

Then came the "Summit Series" of 1972 where, for the first time, Canadian players from the National Hockey League played the Soviets in what has become folk lore in Canada. If you have seen the film footage and/or the made-for-TV movie about the series, you'll know that it was won on a goal by Paul Henderson in the dying stages of the last of eight games, in Moscow. But a new era had dawned. Canada no longer had a monopoly on hockey. The rest of the world was catching up and catching up fast.

Well my maple syrup eating, Tim Hortons drinking countrymen, the same thing is happening in curling.  All you had to do was watch the recent women's and men's world championships to know that the game that was born in Scotland but grew up in Canada, now belongs to the world. And Canada in general, and the Canadian Curling Association in particular played in integral role in making it so and full marks to them! Canadian teaching materials, equipment and instructing/coaching personnel were dispatched to any nation interested. The game moved forward on an international scale.

Then came the Nagano Winter Olympic Games. Canada did not win both gold medals as many simply assumed it would. And many smaller nations at the doorstep of Winter Olympic participation were watching. The lesson learned was that with all that Canadian assistance, it too could identify a relatively small group of athletes, teach them how to curl, fund a national programme, send them to Canada for the invaluable experience and dream of a podium finish at a future Winter Olympic Games.

Sweden learned the lesson best it would appear and now funds not one, but two men's teams comprised of full time curlers, training under a detailed, demanding, podium oriented training programme under the guidance of Peter Lindholm, three time men's world champion. I suspect, but at this writing can't confirm that the same is true for female elite Swedish teams. Other countries are following in lockstep taking strides leading them to challenge the Maple Leaf teams just as effectively as the Swedes. The playing field is only a few degrees from being level. The future is now!

So as not to leave the impression that Canada has been sitting on its hands allowing the developing curling countries to track us down, our best young athletes and their teams have been identified, a posse has been formed and the cavalry is on the way! Programmes such as La Releve and a carding initiative have provided the funds needed for those identified athletes and those teams that have by merit, earned the funding. New funding formulae are being considered through the "Own the Podium" programme. That funding along with an array of performance enhancement professionals made available to the athletes hopefully will help to keep up with the aforementioned international challengers.

The "mine canary" in all of this is the results of the last 10 junior world championships. Of the potential 20 junior world championships, Canadian junior teams have won only 4, all on the men's side. No, I have no explanation save the one that's the premise of this post, the world is catching up and doing so at break neck speed. If Canada wishes to continue its dominance on the world curling stage, we're going to have to do something and sorry, I don't know what that something is at this point.

Before I sign off on this topic, to those burgeoning countries on the world stage, I have a question for you. Are you spending the same resources on the growth of the game in your country as you obviously are getting a team on that Winter Olympic Podium? I sincerely hope so because to not do so is disingenuous in my view and something of a slap in the face to the country that opened its resources to you to get you where you are!

But it's a brave new world at the top which isn't going to change anytime soon and it's just the beginning I'm afraid! I believe we'd better tighten our chin straps!