Top national curlers will be in Napanee

NAPANEE, Ont. (24/01/12) Ice technician Frank Dunham pebbles the curling sheet at the Napanee District Curling Club by spraying water on the frozen surface before youth casual games on Tuesday, January 24th, 2012. Photo by Cole Breiland

By Cole Breiland

Over 100 of the best Canadian junior curlers will be in the house in Napanee just over a week from now for the M&M Meat Shop Junior National Curling tournament.

The curlers and an estimated 6,000 fans will fill the Strathcona Paper Centre and Napanee District Curling Club over two weeks, beginning Feb. 4.

“I’m looking forward to seeing the first rock thrown,” says Stephen Paul, tournament chairperson and manager of economic development of Lennox and Addington County.

Paul is excited about the level of competition showcased at the tournament. “To get here is not an easy task. This is the cream of the crop for junior curling.”

The winner will be difficult to predict, he said “It is a bit of a rarity, a lot of teams are first timers, so it’s been hard to get a handle on who are the teams to watch.”

The calibre of players attending is high. Yukon skip Thomas Scoffin and Manitoba second Derek Oryniak claimed bronze last Wednesday as part of the Canadian team at the youth Olympic games in Innsbruck, Austria.

Paul said the community has been very supportive, and that the tournament has a chance to show off the community to the attendees, and to the wider curling world. The semi-final and final matches will be televised on TSN.

He said he has no hard numbers on the economic benefit of the tournament to the community, but estimates the tournament is responsible for 1,500 hotel reservations, filling the town’s hotels and motels to capacity, as well as reservations in other communities, including Belleville.

To prepare for the guests, the Napanee District Curling Club had a $72,000 renovation, paid for through a $32,000 Trillium grant and proceeds from the Ontario men’s championship which Napanee hosted two years ago.

Volunteer co-ordinator Sandy Eastlake has recruited 190 volunteers, largely from curling clubs in the area, to handle functions as varying as ice maintenance, game scoring, hospitality, security and transportation.

The Strathcona Paper Centre will be converted from a hockey rink to five curling sheets, a process that ice technician Frank Dunham explained will take an estimated 40 consecutive hours to complete, after a Napanee Raiders’ game on Jan. 30.  A team of more than 12 will flood, paint and pebble the ice, as well as set up walkways and equipment for the teams.

Dunham, a curler for 15 years and ice technician for 14 years at the Napanee club, will be one of the crew pebbling the ice between games and making sure it is in top shape to play on.

Dunham explained the temperature of the building, temperature of the ice, number of spectators and even the particular set of curling rocks affects the way the ice must be prepared. “It’s quite technical; it looks easy because you throw water on a cold spot and it freezes, but the technicalities are very involved.”

The tournament begins on Feb. 4. Women’s finals will be held on Feb. 11. Men’s finals will be held on Sun. 12. Tickets are available from the Strathcona Paper Centre box office at 16 McPherson Drive or by calling 613-354-4423.