Local curlers sweep hard into new season

By Craig Moy

The scraping of polished stone sliding across ice, the soft sweeping of brushes, and the emphatic shouting of men and women urging their rocks toward the button; these are the familiar sounds inside the Ottawa Curling Club (OCC) each fall and winter.

Those sounds will be even more prominent this year, as Ottawa’s best curlers compete in a number of top-level area bonspiels. Each team is looking to win money and earn spots in the 2004 provincial championships, the Nokia Brier, and the relatively new Canada Cup of Curling.

However, before any Ottawa rinks can realize these aspirations, they’ll be hoping for local success on the Ottawa Valley Curling Tour (OVCT).

Formed in 2001, the OVCT offers local curlers a venue to hone their skills and compete for close to $100,000 in six bonspiels and a tour championship.

“It’s probably the best local tour there is in any city in Canada,” says Bryan Cochrane, skip of last year’s Ontario champion men’s rink, about the Ottawa tour.

The talent pool in Ottawa is indeed quite deep, and rinks hoping to win the region’s top events will take on teams led by the likes of past Brier participants Howard Rajala and Chris Fulton, along with the Ottawa Curling Club’s own Sebastien Robillard, whom Cochrane has dubbed the “up-and-coming team to watch.”

These teams and many others already went head-to-head at the fourth annual Parliament Cup, held on Thanksgiving weekend at the OCC.

The Quebec-based rink of Jean-Michel Ménard won the bonspiel by defeating Robillard’s team in a 7-2 decision.

This year’s tournament provided extra incentive, with the winning side gaining qualifying points for the 2004 Canada Cup in Kamloops, B.C.- a national tournament which lacks the prestige of the Brier, but nonetheless carries a $30,000 first prize and a spot in the 2005 Olympic trials for the victors.

Ménard’s rink took the maximum 15 points for their victory over what was “by far the best field we’ve ever had,” says John Steski, president of the Ottawa Valley Curling Tour, and organizer of the Parliament Cup.

Emile Tougas, the Ottawa Curling Club’s manager agrees, saying, “we’ve had pretty good fields at almost every event this year.”

Cochrane and his rink placed highly in the event just two weeks after winning the RCMP Fall Open.

“Our team is off to a good start,” says Cochrane, adding that their experience in last year’s Brier has given them a mental edge in high-stakes competitions.

The next big goal for Ottawa curlers is the Cowan Wright Beauchamp, a lucrative bonspiel that will be co-hosted by the Ottawa, Rideau and RCMP curling clubs at the end of November. With a $60,000 purse, “It’s one of the premier events on the Ottawa calendar,” says Steski.

Cochrane says no team will be resting on their laurels this season, as the fierce competition means a different rink could win each Ottawa event.

“The Ottawa area, and Ontario, both remain difficult places to repeat as champions,” he says.