The provincial champion will characterize Northern Ontario on the nationals in Summerside, P.E.I. subsequent month.
KAKABEKA FALLS — Fourteen tandems will likely be battling it out for provincial glory over the subsequent few days on the Kakabeka Falls Curling Membership.
The Northern Ontario blended doubles provincial championship started on Wednesday afternoon and a champion will likely be topped on Sunday night.
Rylie Paul is curling at her residence membership alongside Owen Weiss of the Port Arthur Curling Centre in what will likely be their first time taking part in collectively.
“I wanted to enter for a couple of reasons,” Paul mentioned. “I wanted to get some practice in before the Under-18 nationals in a couple of weeks and I wanted to play in a provincial at my home club.”
“The sweeping of your own rocks is definitely a challenge, especially without your gripper on,” Weiss added. “It’s a lot of fun though and we’re hoping to just have a fun time.”
Nearly all of the sphere comes from the area. Kakabeka Falls and Fort William Curling are represented, together with squads from Terrace Bay Curling and Curl Fort Frances.
Chris Bowman and his sister Jamie of the North Bay Granite Membership made the longest trek to the provincials.
“We’ve been playing together in mixed doubles for about five years and I like it a lot,” Chris Bowman mentioned.
“It’s a fast game and it’s a new take on curling. It’s a lot of fun for me.”
The latest former champion within the discipline is Sudbury’s Amanda Gates. She captured the Northern Ontario title with Trevor Bonot in 2018.
Gates, who received a silver medal with Bonot on the 2022 Canadian Combined Curling Championships, is teaming up with Dustin Montpellier this weekend.
“I think mixed doubles is really growing in Northern Ontario, especially with a lot of younger teams coming in,” Gates mentioned.
“The 14 teams that are here I think is the most that I’ve seen at the provincials that I’ve been at. It’s tough to find three people to commit to a whole season so mixed doubles gives you that chance to find that one person and go for it.”
Along with solely having two gamers on a staff, solely six rocks are thrown in every of the eight ends and rocks are already in the home, which ends up in higher-scoring motion.
“That always gets a reaction from people when they see a mixed doubles game for the first time and there’s rocks in play right away,” Jamie Bowman mentioned. “For me as a player, that makes things a lot more interesting.”
“If you are coming out this week, you definitely want to be here early with how fast the game is, especially with the strategy,” Gates added.
The opening ceremonies happen at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday with the second draw within the triple knockout occasion getting underway at 7:30 p.m.
The championship contest takes place at 4 p.m. Sunday. The winner will characterize Northern Ontario on the nationwide occasion in Summerside, P.E.I. subsequent month.
A full schedule and scores might be discovered on the Northern Ontario Curling Affiliation’s web site.
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