Curlers weather ice-cold wind

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This article was published 04/02/2019 (2680 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Teams of hearty curlers took to the ice on the Red River Sunday morning in a bracing north wind that made it feel like -34C.

Exposed to the elements, they were playing for fun, a good cause and survival in the annual Ironman Outdoor Curling Bonspiel that began Friday.

Founded in 2001, the bonspiel promotes “outdoor activity and a healthy lifestyle,” while raising money for the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Manitoba. This year, 60 teams took part and raised $102,078.50.

For first-time curler and software developer Keaton Cross, it was a way to beat cabin fever.

“It was fun the whole time, learning a new sport,” said Cross, 22, who grew up in Vermont. Three of the four twenty-somethings on his team had never curled before, but made it to Sunday’s playoffs. That was thanks to their experienced skip, Bailey Shirtliff, Cross said.

“This guy carried us to victory,” he joked.

Their team, from the artificial intelligence company Sightline Innovation, made it to the playoffs on Sunday, but lost their fourth and final game.

“It was fun,” said Shirtliff, 24. “I tried to do a minimal amount of coaching.

“The goal was to try and make sure they enjoy themselves the first time,” said the skip, who learned to curl in Grade 4 in Starbuck. The novices had nothing to compare the conditions outside on the frozen river to, and that might have been to their advantage.

On the rougher outdoor surface, most curlers stood and used their brooms to send their rocks to the other end of the ice rather than trying to heave them from the hack. There was a slope at one end of Sheet One that was particularly vexing, said Cross, who seemed to have caught the curling bug anyhow.

“I want to go curling on real fake ice indoors,” he enthused.

“It was a good first experience,” Cross added, liking the camraderie of curling — even among competitors.

“They were very friendly and happy just to be there curling.”

carol.sanders@freepress.mb.ca