Curling season has come early to enthusiasts in the Battlefords and Saskatchewan.
The much-anticipated CurlSask high-performance training centre is now officially open at Northland Power Curling Centre.
A news conference, attended by curling officials as well as Mayor Ryan Bater, was held Thursday of last week at the curling centre to officially open the high-performance centre. The new ice surface was ready as of Aug. 17, roughly two months earlier than usual.
According to Ashley Howard, executive director of CurlSask, the centre has been a vision of their organization for years. The high-performance training centre is “something that has been on our agendas, on our strategic plans, for years.”
CurlSask is clearly motivated by a desire to win. On the men’s side, Saskatchewan has not won a Brier since 1980, and while the women’s side has seen more success, keeping up with other provinces such as Alberta and British Columbia is an ongoing issue. There, elite curlers have had greater access to facilities where they can train full-time.
“We want to give our teams all the tools they can to win,” said Howard.
Early ice is critical, she said, so “you are sharp at those events early in the year and pick up those CTRS (Canadian Team Ranking System) points that get you into pre-trials for the Olympics or the Olympic trials themselves. Just so important to give our teams the chance, and not fall behind other provinces, honestly.”
A number of factors swung in favour of North Battleford as the choice for the training centre. What impressed CurlSask officials was the facility itself and its ability to handle major events.
“We were so impressed with the Saskatchewan Winter Games, the ice conditions, the facility, the volunteers. The group here in the Battlefords, we felt, can handle what we were looking for in a high-performance training centre, including those world-class ice conditions.”
The ability to install early ice is not readily available in the province. Howard credited the foresight of the early partners behind Northland Power Curling Centre for designing a facility that had that capacity.
Their ice technician Ian Naismith did not have any concerns about installing ice in 30-degree summer weather.
“Basically, an install is an install. It’s just time,” said Naismith. “Because of the warmer temperatures, everything just takes longer.”
In October, the surface might go from concrete slab to ice in six days. But for this effort, it took about two and a half weeks, starting Aug. 1.
Some 20 volunteers were needed, and the effort involved a lot of work at night, when temperatures were more favourable for the ice to be put in.
“You can’t really work during the heat of the day; the plant has to work too hard,” said Naismith.
“Unlike what most people think, you can’t really make anything colder, you have to remove the heat. So if you add water you add heat, and then the plant has to remove that heat, and it can’t. It doesn’t have the capacity to do it on a 38-degree day.”
Once the ice is put in, the hard part is over.
“Installing it is the biggest job, most labour intensive,” said Naismith. But the day-to-day maintenance of the ice is pretty much the same as the rest of the year.
“I just have to pay a little bit more attention to temperatures, the air temperature, the ice temperature. It’s a little more finicky this time of year.”
Besides the early start to the curling season, there are other advantages offered by the high-performance training centre. Most notable is the use of video-analysis equipment within the curling centre.
Cameras are set up to record the shots that curlers make on the ice, and that video is replayed moments later on screens set up next to the ice surface. That way, curlers get an immediate sense of how they performed.
The video frames are at “60 frames per second, which is an insanely slow rate,” said Howard.
“You can see absolutely every movement, and fix it. And I do think that will improve the quality of the play in the province, and the number of high performance teams we have.”
Already, some elite teams have been using the high-performance centre.
The team of Daymond Bernath, which won gold this February at the Saskatchewan Winter Games, was on the ice training last Thursday. Howard’s own team hit the rink right after the media conference was over.
However, it was noted that use of the high-performance training centre is not limited to elite curlers.
“Club members, residents of the Battlefords can come in try curling early in the season when the kids are out of school,” said Howard.
“The ice is open for rentals, and even try out some of the video equipment.”
Twin Rivers Curling Club manager Doug Flasch is excited about the new training centre.
“It’s definitely got us thinking about curling a lot more and a lot quicker,” said Flasch.
“We’ve had lots of people coming through here and watching the practices. And we’ve got the ice full almost on every draw here we’ve had. We’ve had three a day. So that’s really good to see.”
There are some other benefits to partnership. Some early-season events are planned for Twin Rivers Curling Club in conjunction with CurlSask.
One of them is the Battlefords Mixed Doubles Fall Curling Classic happening Aug. 31 to Sept. 3. It will include a 24-team competitive division and a $13,500 prize purse.
Sept. 7-9 will be the Under-21 Slam and there are already 20 teams entered in that.
Coming up not long afterwards will be the Battlefords Swing and Slide Classic Sept. 14-16 which will be a combined curling-and-golf event, with competitors taking part in curling at the curling centre and then golf at the North Battleford Golf and Country Club.
There are also plans for the curling club to hold an inaugural Curling Clinic on Oct. 26-28 offered by the Academy of Curling. It will include training from the likes of Russ Howard, Mary-Anne Arsenault and Grant Odishaw.
The high point for curling fans promises to be the return of the Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling to the Civic Centre in early January.
“It’s very exciting for the curling here,” said Flasch. “The whole town is talking about curling right now.”
