Chop shop

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 30/04/2016 (3777 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

During the talent competition of the 2013 Miss Canada International pageant, Melanie Williamson melted the judges’ hearts with her rendition of Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend.

Williamson’s version of the Broadway chestnut helped her take home the tiara, it’s true. But if the Kitchener, Ont., native had the chance to go back in time and do it all over again, she would. Only this time she’d be armed and dangerous.

“I’ve thought about it lots… about how much better it would have been if, at the end of the song, I had tossed a few axes,” Williamson said with a laugh, noting her claim to fame is being the shortest woman — “five feet two AND A HALF” — ever crowned Miss Canada International.

Williamson is the expansion manager for Bad Axe Throwing, an Ontario-based venture that is turning its namesake pursuit — a sport generally associated with loggers and lumberjacks — into a leisure activity on par with miniature golf and laser tag. Recently, the spirited, 23-year-old business major, whose business card reads “Queen of Axes,” was in Winnipeg overseeing an open house at the firm’s latest location, at 1393 Border St. When Williamson wasn’t busy touring curious types around the 3,000-square-foot facility, which still had that fresh, sawdust smell, she was wowing them with her, well, axe-pertise.

“Something I’ve really been working on since joining Bad Axe is my trick throws,” she said, rolling up the sleeves of her plaid chemise and taking dead aim at her target, all the while rocking a pair of black, knee-high boots. “My coolest one to date is when I hit the bull’s-eye after doing a one-handed cartwheel, while holding an axe to my chest.” (Uh, we’re just going to put down our notepad and take a few steps back, if you don’t mind…)

“It’s the kind of deal where if you had asked people what sort of new things they’d like to see in the city, you probably wouldn’t have gotten too many responses along the lines of axe throwing,” said Dan Pohl, one of the Winnipeg range’s two coaches/hosts. “But as soon as you say, ‘Hey, do want to go throw some axes?’ you either get a definitive yes or a curious yes, but not a whole lot of nos.’”

Axe throwing seems pretty self-explanatory but there are a few rules associated with the goings-on at Bad Axe. First, this isn’t a case of BYOB (bring your own blade): all hardware is supplied by the company. There are two lanes — both self-enclosed — with a pair of targets in each one. The distance between release point and target is approximately four metres — the goal being to deliver your axe (which is more of a hatchet, really) so it completes one full revolution before striking the wood. Sure, you have to sign a waiver, but the only mishaps Williamson is aware of are ripped shirts in the rotator cuff area, thanks to a combination of tight fits and overzealous tosses.

Bringing the axe back over your head and hurling it with two hands — basically the same motion you would use to inbound a soccer ball — tends to work best, advised Pohl, 26, who was taught the proper technique during Festival du Voyageur’s annual voyageur games.

“People pick it up just like that. Last night I had a seven-year-old kid give it a shot, as well as a 75-year-old gentleman who was cruising around the parking lot for 15 minutes before we even opened. He had on a shirt and tie — he was on his way to a banquet, apparently — but he heard about us on the radio and wanted to check us out beforehand,” Pohl said, turning around quickly to see what the two dozen or so people lined up behind him were hooting and hollering about. (It turned out a 19-year-old named Tracy nailed the bull’s-eye with her first fling, prompting her to raise her palms to the ceiling and joke, “That’s it; I’m outta here.”)

Mario Zelaya is the owner of Bad Axe Throwing. Since opening his flagship location in his hometown of Burlington, Ont., in October 2014, he and his associates have rolled out six more Bad Axe Throwing centres in the Greater Toronto Area, as well as one in Edmonton and now Winnipeg. Two more — in Surrey, B.C. and Montreal — should be up and running by the end of June, he notes.

“It might sound like an unconventional business, but figuring out how to make it work wasn’t much different than anything else I’ve been involved with,” Zelaya said when reached by phone in Burlington, where he is also the managing director of a digital firm called Majestic Media. “The problems were obviously different. What kind of wood would we need? What kind of axes should we buy? What are the rules going to be? But my background is marketing and from the start, I’ve run Bad Axe more like a tech company, by educating people about what the experience is going to be like by crafting videos and hiring creative directors to get the message out there.”

From the get-go, axe throwing has proven popular with social gatherings along the lines of team-building exercises and birthday festivities, he said. For the time-being, the Winnipeg location is available for private functions only but depending upon demand, it could morph into a come-and-go facility, not unlike a bowling alley, he added.

“Stags are obviously a huge deal but I was surprised because bachelorette parties are really big, too,” Williamson said, mentioning the Winnipeg location doesn’t have a liquor license yet, but that is something they’ll look into acquiring, down the line. “Sometimes (the women) will put pictures of their ex-boyfriends on the targets and let ‘em have it, which is always amusing.

“But no matter who shows up, they all agree it’s addictive. You’ll come here for an office party and the next thing you know, you’ll be back with your softball team or whatever.”

Marcie, a mother of three, heard about Bad Axe Throwing in February, when a “coming soon” blurb about the facility popped up on her Facebook account. She wrote the date of the open house on the calendar and showed up with her husband and three kids in tow.

“After I got over the fear that I was going to do something stupid like a put a hole in their wall (with the axe), I started to relax and enjoy myself,” Marcie said, taking a break from a game called Tic Tac Throw, which is played on 3×3 grid taped over the target area. “I grew up on a farm, so I’m pretty comfortable with axes, but what I didn’t expect was that it would be such a good workout, too. I’ve only been throwing for 15 minutes but I’m already pretty hot.”

Marcie overheard Williamson and Pohl discussing the possibility of an axe throwing league — something she’d definitely be interested in joining, she said.

“I do shift work, so it depends on the hours, but yeah, after running around all day, this would be a great place to come to blow off a little steam.”

For more information, go to www.badaxethrowing.com/axe-throwing-winnipeg.

david.sanderson@freepress.mb.ca