Thursday 26 April 2018

International Junior Club Curling Bonspiel

Last season, Gogar Park Young Curlers hosted the International Junior Club Curling Bonspiel at Murrayfield.  In fact a GPYC team, skipped by Adam Keron, with Holly Davis and C & B club members Kirsty Barr and Emma Barr won the overall competition (writes Andrew Barr).

This year, the competition was held in Pinerolo on the three-sheet rink that sits next to the Turin Olympic curling venue where David Murdoch's team GB came so agonisingly close in their semi-final match against Finland.  The big rink was also the venue for the World Junior Championships in which a previous generation of junior C & B members competed - Kerry Barr playing in the ladies competition and Graeme Copland eventually winning the Bronze medal in the men's championship.  Graeme went on the next year to win a Silver medal against the USA in the World University Games final at the same venue - the winning skip that year?  John Shuster, recent Gold medal winner at the Winter Olympic Games!  Small world, the curling world!

Anyhow, enough history!  The same team tried very hard to defend their title and just came up short, finishing second - even though they beat the winners in their final game.  As Andrew finished his report, "Don't even ask - some complicated Schenkel format".

Reminds me of the Paris Viry Cup in 1978.  Same thing happened to us.  Dodgy measure by an umpire on that occasion.  Clearly our stone was nearer the middle by about three inches, but the  umpire kicked it away and grandly said that the other team had won.  I'm not bitter or anything.  Not me.  Still rankles though.  I found the umpire in a bar later.  He was a steward.  A bar steward.

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