The Cochrane Curling Club hosted its annual Women’s Bonspiel over the weekend of Mar. 11-13, with a success that has typified the club throughout its long history.
18 teams took part in this year’s edition , six of which came from the club’s Monday night ladies league, and one from the senior division. The rest came from Calgary and surrounding areas.
“The most our rink can hold is 24, and we had 22 originally signed up,” said first-time organizer Sharon Caron. “Some had to cancel but it was still a fun weekend with 18 teams.”
The A event was won by Team Muise from Calgary. Team Olsen (also from Calgary) were the B event winners, and a third Calgary foursome, Team Wytryowski won the C event. Team Hyde-Wilson from the Cochrane seniors division captured first in the D event.
For the last few years, teams entering the women’s bonspiel have fluctuated between 16 and 24, while the men’s bonspiel has been packed full, what does Caron attribute this to?
“It depends,” she said. “This was really a bad weekend, because of all the people away with their kids for hockey playoffs, or the southern play-downs in curling. We miss a lot of women because they are playing mom so they have other commitments.”
This marks the second-last year that the curling club will be holding bonspiels in their old rink before moving to a new one at Spray Lake Sawmills Family Sports Centre which is currently under construction and is expected to contain six sheets of ice.
Is anything special being planned for next year to mark the move?
“We’ve been talking about it, but nothing has been written yet,” Caron said. “We would like to do something special, so next week we’re going to have a meeting and discuss the situation.”
