Edinburgh International Curling Championship

The Winners

2011-11-28T10:44:00.003Z

L-R: Tom Brewster, Greg Drummond, Scott Andrews and Michael Goodfellow pose with the famous old 'Worlds Championships' trophy, first played for in 1922.

The runners-up, Sandy Reid, Moray Combe, Neil Macarthur and Dave Soutar, pose with the Berne Bear.

Photos by Robin Copland

Edinburgh International Senior Championship 2011

2011-11-28T10:32:00.003Z

The Winners of the Edinburgh International Senior Championship. L-R: Alastair Galloway (lead), Trevor Dodds (Chair of the Edinburgh International organising committee and third player), Mike Dick (skip), sponsor John Dignan (Managing Director of the Best Western Braid Hills Hotel, and Colin Baxter (second). Mike skipped Colin Hamilton’s entry in the semifinal and final of the competition in Colin’s absence.

David Clydesdale, Billy Johnston, Alistair Wood and Dougie Rodger lost a hard-fought final.

Alan Durno, John Paul, Ronnie Wilson and Mike Watt, were winners of the consolation event. They scored a two in their final end against ...

... Gary Macfarlane, Douglas Ratcliffe, Stewart Philp and Alan Guthrie to overhaul the Braehead team and win the competition by one shot.

Photos by Robin Copland

Sunday at Murrayfield

2011-11-28T10:12:00.002Z

Sunday threw up a feast of curling in the quarterfinals with three games pitching Scottish teams against overseas opposition and one all-Scotland match involving teams Brewster and Gray. Logan took an early lead in this match in end four when he scored a big 3. To their credit, David Edwards and his team took things down the last end with the scores tied at four-all. Logan nailed his four-foot draw with the hammer and for David, it was over and out – their first loss of the weekend.

A three in the first end helped Sandy Reid to a 6-1 lead by the fifth end of their match against Joel Retornaz. Joel will be happy with his Edinburgh workout before representing Italy in the upcoming European Championships in Moscow at the beginning of December – a quarterfinal finish in the Champions Tour event earns him some more points after his semifinal appearance in an earlier competition.

It was the same story in the other two quarters with both Scottish teams prevailing. David Smith scored a three in the sixth end to secure his win over Team Hauser and Tom Brewster was just too strong for the Swiss team skipped by Pascal Hess. It was a tight game until a big four in end seven secured Tom’s semifinal place.

In the Gray versus Reid semifinal, Logan, Al Guthrie, Steve Mitchell and Sandy Gilmour never really got to grips with things and constantly found themselves up against it. Sandy Reid and his team were clinical and a four in the fourth end secured the win. Logan was 1-7 down at that point and realised that it wasn’t his day. Their semifinal place will earn them valuable points in the Champions Tour league table and move them into the top ten.

A really tight semifinal in the webcast game between Tom Brewster and David Smith was no surprise. Many of the ends were enthralling, as you would expect from two teams at the very top of their game. Warwick and David Smith are not related but they share a talent. Craig Wilson may hardly have thrown a stone this season, but he came out firing on all cylinders and his front-end mate Ross Hepburn demonstrated why he is a three-time Scottish champion. It went to the eighth end; Warwick had it in his grasp to make Tom’s life very difficult indeed but – and this is rare – draw weight deserted him. A Brewster versus Reid final was on the cards – a repeat of the Scottish Championship final at the end of last season.

Sandy’s team, with Moray Combe throwing last stones, Neil MacArthur replacing Scott Macleod from last season and Dave Soutar at lead, started off with a nicely-crafted two in the very first end and held onto that advantage for the next few ends. At the fifth end the scores were tied 3-all. To write it like that, it seems as if the game was boring; anything but! It ebbed; it flowed. One minute, the advantage seemed to be with Team Reid and the next it swung the other way.

In end six, Tom flashed an outturn hit with his first stone and Moray played a raise. Tom eyed up a treble to keep him in the game, slid down to the other end and played it. A big, big end was suddenly turned into a blank! That was one of two stones that sealed the game for Team Brewster. End 7 saw Team Reid take a single, which took things down the last end. Things looked good for Tom, but there was a guard covering the corner of the four foot. Sandy and Moray were left with a choice: freeze a Brewster counter at the back of the house, or take on an outturn draw down some rough ice. Moray played a clinker and thought that he had secured at least an extra end. Tom had other ideas though and played a big weight angled raise onto the Reid counter. To make matters worse from Team Reid’s point of view, he hung around as well.

Game over and a first-time win in the competition for Tom Brewster, Greg Drummond (whose brother Kerr had won the competition last season), Scott Andrews and Michael Goodfellow. Moray Combe and Neil MacArthur are previous winners of the competition. They, skip Sandy Reid and lead Dave Soutar can be proud of their competition and they gave the big crowd an entertaining and high quality game in the final.

For Tom and his team, this was the fifth final of the season and their first win, as Tom ruefully admitted during the presentation ceremony in the Edinburgh Curling Club rooms. The win moves them up from third place in the Champions Tour league and may even put them into top spot – depending on the exchange rate with the Canadian Dollar!

Robin Copland

Photos of the Day

2011-11-27T15:04:00.008Z

Here is a selection of favourite Bob Kelly photos from yesterday!

"Referee, referee!"

"Does Loudmouth not do matching beanie hats?"

"And then the alligator said.... ?"

"Ross Paterson. Son of Patter!"

"Fashion Wars!"

"Concentration." Joel Retornaz, Italy.

"Blue eyes. My favourite."

"The best sweepers are the ones who say, 'This stone is too heavy', and it stops on the tee."

Photos by Bob Kelly, captions by Bob Cowan. Alternate captions welcomed!

Round Robin Report

2011-11-27T10:04:00.002Z

Robin Copland writes:

The round-robin sections at this year’s Edinburgh International are now over and have thrown up some interesting results and quarterfinals.

In section A Thomas Ulsrud and Sandy Reid looked like the class of the field. Ulsrud was taking the competition seriously enough, bringing with him long-term coach Ole Ingvaldsen and fifth man Thomas Løvold. They rotated their team to ensure that Thomas got some competitive curling under his belt and were using the event as final competitive practice before the European Championships in Moscow at the beginning of December. A mixed competition when all said and done and I don’t suppose Thomas necessarily wants to meet Lee McCleary, James Stark, Neil Joss or Gavin Fleming anytime soon! Lee had the better of the Norwegians not only in their round-robin game, but crucially in the four-end play-off game as well. Still and all, five games of curling in a competitive environment and three wins under their belt will not be seen as a complete disaster for the red-trousered Norwegian outfit.

Sandy Reid has had a good competition to date and he and Moray Combe look to be throwing the stone well enough. After a first round set back against Ulsrud, they went undefeated and progressed through to Sunday morning’s quarterfinals as winners of their section. Lee McCleary’s win over Ulsrud in the first of the section play-off games set up a play-off for second place against Pascal Hess’s strong-looking Swiss team of Yves Hess, Florian Meister and Stefan Meienberg. A tight game, this one with McCleary lying three after his last stone in the first end. Hess attempted a come around draw to the face of a McCleary stone that had gone maybe a foot too far onto the tee line. Frantic Swiss sweeping kept Hess’s last stone straight enough to just skiff a tight guard and end up in second shot spot to lose only a one against the head. McCleary so nearly stole a three. The last end was where it all went wrong for Lee. A lovely early-in-the-end split left the Swiss lying the two shots they needed and, try as they might, Lee’s team could not get the crucial roll behind some promising cover. When Lee’s last stone ended up a tad light and crashed a guard, that was it and Hess progressed through in second place to the quarterfinals.

In section B, reigning Scottish champions, Tom Brewster, Greg Drummond, Scott Andrews and Michael Goodfellow sailed through undefeated; they had already qualified in an unassailable first place before they met Markku Uusipaavalniemi in their last round-robin game. Markku was relying on beating Tom and Joel Retornaz losing his game for a play-off spot. Neither happened, so he returns to Finland with two wins under his belt. Graeme Black and John Hamilton had forgettable weekends and although they ran other teams close, they could not finish them off. In the end, they did not need to play their last game. Joel Retornaz will be pleased with his round-robin competition and the Italians did well to come out of a difficult looking group with four wins out of five, including a stuffy win over Swiss favourites, the Berne team skipped by Stefan Hässler.

Section C was always going to be difficult for any of the teams without someone called Smith in them! True to form, veterans David and Warwick, ably aided and abetted by perhaps the most experienced front end in the business, Craig Wilson and Ross Hepburn, went through the section undefeated. Stranraer’s Frazer Hare ran them close and local boy Paul Stevenson found himself four up early on in their game. That just got the Smith rollercoaster upset! They went on to score a couple of big ends in the latter part of their game and ran out 6-4 winners. After a heavy first-round defeat at the hands of Smith, big Logan Gray took the section by the scruff of the neck. He, Al Guthrie, Steve Mitchell and Sandy Gilmour were run close a couple of times, notably by Frazer Hare, who can count himself unlucky not to have taken Logan down an extra end when his last stone did more damage than good and ended up gifting a steal of two to the grateful Stirling skip; Team Gray weathered that particular storm and made the quarterfinals with a 4-1 record.

Finally, a tough looking D section had the two Davids, Murdoch and Edwards, along with Hauser, Graham Shedden, reigning champions Graham Shaw (with David Hay skipping and throwing last stones) and the Czech Republic’s European representatives, Jiri Snitil, making up the six. David Murdoch had a lacklustre campaign by his high standards, ending up on two wins out of five. His Moscow alternate David Edwards skipped his new team of Scottish junior champion skip John Penny, the newly transferred second from Team Sandy Reid, Scott Macleod and lead Colin Campbell to an impressive five straight wins. This team looked the part and faced Jiri Snitil’s Czech team in their last game. The Snitil team played a tight defensive game against David and maybe didn’t go attacking until too late in the game. A sweeping error on Snitil’s last stone in the seventh end sealed their fate and let David hit for home in the eighth. A shame for Snitil – he and his team were another team using the competition as a final staging post before Moscow. They needed to win their last game to set up a potential play-off for a quarterfinal spot with Switzerland’s team Hauser – assuming Hauser lost to the Shaw team. It wasn’t to be; Hauser sneaked a two in the last end of their game versus Shaw and Snitil, as we have seen, lost to Edwards in a game that was webcast on the Saturday night and picked up as far away as Florida by Hugh Craigie – there on holiday and soaking up the sun.

So, where before there were twenty four, now there are but eight. The quarterfinals start at 8.30 Sunday and pit Sandy Reid against Joel Retornaz, David Smith against Jan Hauser, David Edwards against Logan Gray and finally Tom Brewster against Pascal Hess. We will webcast one of the semifinals at 11.30 and the final at 2.30. What price an all-Scottish semi-final line up? Well – it could happen and we shall have to wait and see what transpires.

The seniors return to Edinburgh on Sunday for their semifinals and finals, played at 11.30 and 2.30. The presentation of prizes will be in the club rooms around 5.00pm.

Written by Robin Copland

Saturday at Murrayfield

2011-11-26T20:04:00.009Z

Murrayfield, Edinburgh International Championship, Day 2. The main website for results and link to live webcasts is here.

Bob Kelly has contributed these photos for today's blog post.

Team Ulsrud

Captions invited for this photo of the Norwegians!

Tom Brewster!

The others in the Tom Brewster team. Scott Andrews delivers. Michael Goodfellow and Greg Drummond are the sweepers.

"Hey guys, it's over here!" The Lee McCleary team.

Logan Gray delivers, with Steven Mitchell and Sandy Gilmour his sweepers.

Logan contemplates what might have been!

Paul Stevenson needing a hug!

Moray Combe

Joel Retornaz, Italy.

Tom Brewster is in the head in his game against the Italians.

David Hay

David Murdoch

Captions by Bob Cowan. Photos by Bob Kelly!

Edinburgh International 2011

2011-11-25T21:52:00.006Z

Play in the 2011 Edinburgh International Curling Championship got underway today at the Murrayfield Rink. All the scores can be found here.

Here are a few photos from today's play.

David Edwards, who will be the David Murdoch's team alternate at the European Championship in Moscow, skipped his own team to a win over Team Murdoch this morning.

David delivers. Colin Campbell and Scott Macleod are the sweepers. John Penny is in the head.

Richard Woods and Ross Paterson work on Glen Muirhead's stone.

Royal Club Head Men's Coach Soren Gran was watching all the action.

Michael Goodfellow and Scott Andrews work on Greg Drummond's stone.

Finland's Markku Uusipaavalniemi

Graeme Copland and Jamie Dick on Philip Garden's stone. Skip John Hamilton in the head.

Team Shedden - Andrew Ballantyne and Chay Telfer.

Italy's Joel Retornaz

Joel's team.

Event chairman, Trevor Dodds, is interviewed by a local reporter.

Photos by Bob Cowan

Presentation Time

2010-11-28T18:13:00.002Z

Robbie Scott, President of the Royal Caledonian Curling Club, presents the Edinburgh International Curling Championship trophy to (L-R) Robin Niven (2nd), Graham Shaw (skip), Kerr Drummond (lead) and David Hay (3rd).

John Dignan (Braid Hills Hotel) presents the Senior Championship trophy to Colin Baxter (lead), Mike Dick (3rd), Colin Hamilton (skip) and Trevor Dodds (2nd). And if it seems that Trevor looks a little tired, as Chair of the Organising Committee, he was in charge of the presentation ceremonies!

Well, that's pretty much it for this year.

Hope you have enjoyed the blog.

Bob

The Finals

2010-11-28T15:40:00.008Z

Let's start with the Seniors first. Colin Hamilton, Mike Dick, Trevor Dodds and Colin Baxter were just too strong for Michael Sutherland, Jim Wood, Frank Forrest and Alan Collette.

Linescore is here, including the Low Road result.

In the International event, Hammy McMillan, David Smith, Ross Paterson and Sandy Gilmour matched up against Graham Shaw, David Hay, Robin Niven and Kerr Drummond.

I found it a great game to watch. Nothing between the teams. Graham's side counted two at the seventh to take a one shot lead into the eighth. Hammy tied it up, and it was into an extra end.

With a long guard and a short one, it was David Smith who managed to hide his second stone which David Hay could not clear away. Hammy froze to it with his first. Graham could do little. Hammy came in on the other hand with his last, finishing open, perhaps six inches too far, but there were three McMillan stones clustered around the button. Graham was perfectly played with his last, a double takeout, with his own shot on the tee for the win. Enthralling.

Linescore is here.

Here are some pics from the International final.

Hammy comes out to help his sweepers with this one of David's.

Hammy and his team were certainly in good form this weekend, prior to them heading off to the European Championships in Champery on Wednesday.

Graham Shaw, with David and Hammy in the background.

Sandy and Ross

Thirds in the head - David (Smith) and David (Hay).

Robin and David looking after Kerr Drummond's stone.

Presentation photos to follow.

Photos © Skip Cottage

International Semifinals

2010-11-28T13:34:00.003Z

Close games. The linescores are here.

McMillan v Reid. McMillan stole the seventh, when Moray's last stone picked. The game was decided on that. Team McMillan, two ahead, cleared up in the eighth.

Murdoch v Shaw. Shaw led Murdoch by a shot after six. The seventh was blanked. With a corner guard in place, David was too heavy with his first. Graham put another in the circles. David had to be in the four-foot to tie the game but came up short this time.

It would be Shaw v McMillan for the title.

Seniors Semifinals

2010-11-28T12:16:00.006Z

It is a feature of the Edinburgh International that the seniors teams which played their early rounds last Wednesday and Thursday join the main event at the semifinal stage. Colin Hamilton is front centre in this pic, his team up against Jacqui Crawford, back right with Helen Burton.

Colin finished on top. The linescores are here.

Michael Sutherland's team made it to the semis too.

Thirds on the house here, this pic just to show how much the seniors like stones in play!

David Clydesdale is in the blue, here discussing options with second player Jim Taylor.

The teams were tied down the eighth, Sutherland not needing his last stone to count a win and a place in the final against Team Hamilton.

Pics © Skip Cottage

Copey the commentator and other stories

2010-11-28T11:39:00.004Z

Organising Committe member Robin Copland is having a weekend to forget. First he was stranded in Ireland on Friday night. Then, this morning, Balerno, a suberb of the capital, was snowbound, and despite his best efforts he could not get his car out from home onto the main road. He came in by bus part of the way, and on foot the rest!

He was due a stint on the webcast commentary (listen here), and, as I write this, he is on his own, various others failing to cope with the blizzards. I suggested he share his commentary with an' imaginary friend'. On second thoughts, as anyone who knows Copey will testify, he will have no problem talking for 150 minute on his own!

'Person of the Day' award goes to Aileen Logan, the Murrayfield Rink bar manager. Not scheduled to be on duty first thing this morning, she nevertheless came in to ensure that, despite the snow, a warm welcome awaited those of us here for the 08.30 session. That first coffee was much appreciated, Aileen.

Pics © Skip Cottage

Quarterfinals

2010-11-28T10:12:00.004Z

The linescores are all here. Above is Hammy McMillan and Scott Hamilton. This game was tied up after seven ends, with Hammy having the hammer in the eighth. After playing a great clearance with his first, he did not need to play his last stone. Hammy, David Smith, Ross Paterson and Sandy Gilmour were through to the semis.

David Sik v Graham Shaw. Graham was one ahead coming home. The Czech skip made his single in the eighth, and it was down an extra end. Graham then failed to draw to an empty house with his last. Another extra! This time, with his last, Graham makes a double kill (just) for the win. Graham Shaw, David Hay, Robin Niven and Kerr Drummond have a place in the semifinals.

Frazer Hare and Sandy Reid. Reid with Moray Combe playing the last stones, Scott Macleod and David Soutar pulled away to a 4-1 lead after five and ran out the winners.

Big game this one - Duncan Fernie against David Murdoch. The score was all square after seven, David playing an angled raise takeout to make two at the penultimate end. With last stone in the eighth, Duncan, needing to get a good bite of the four foot, was too heavy, and Team Murdoch (David, Warwick Smith, Glen Muirhead and Ross Hepburn) was through to the semis.

Photos © Skip Cottage

Snaw

2010-11-28T09:06:00.004Z

It's 08.15 on Sunday morning, and the teams arrive for the quarterfinals of the Edinburgh International. All eight teams made it to the Murrayfield rink, and the four games started on time!

Follow the linescores here.

Pic © Skip Cottage

Section D tiebreakers

2010-11-27T22:55:00.003Z

David Sik beat Lee McLeary, and Scott Hamilton beat Alan Chalmers, both winners into the quarterfinals.

So, the lineup for tomorrow is:

McMillan v S Hamilton

Sik v Shaw

That's it for tonight, folks!

Sections C and D

2010-11-27T20:26:00.004Z

Hammy McMillan was top of Section C and was qualified even before the final section game. He defeated the Finnish visitors to put them out of contention. The league tables are here.

Graham Shaw beat Paul Stevenson to move to three points. And it looked for a long while as if that was it all sorted, John Hamilton's team trailing behind Andrew Reed's English. That's the two skips in the pic above. But Team Hamilton rallied in the seventh, engineered a big four-end, and tied the score going up the eighth. Reed was not going to give in though, and put his last brick right on the button. John Hamilton's four were out. McMillan and Shaw were the two teams through from Section C.

In section D, the Czech side, skipped by David Sik, beat Tom Brewster's four to put them out the competition. Sik then was on three points.

Alan Chalmers, the only team on three points before the final game, had an open hit for a three with his last stone to put his team clear on top of the pile. He edged the Scott Hamilton shot away, rolled out, removing one of his own second counters on the way. His single shot tied the game, and it was down an extra end. Scott had a hit on the nose for the game, and this he made. Both Scott Hamilton and Alan Chalmers then were on three points too!

Over on Sheet 4, Logan Gray, out of contention, played out a tied game against Lee McLeary, and that game was into a ninth end. Lee had the full house to draw to with his last and he had no difficulty with that. Team McLeary, three points.

So, four teams on three points. How to get to two? Two short four-end tiebreakers. McLeary v Sik, and Chalmers v Scott Hamilton again.

Section A and B done and dusted

2010-11-27T18:52:00.014Z

Well, we now know the qualifiers from Sections A and B. As I mentioned before, Sandy Reid is top of Section A. David Murdoch's side beat the Hungarians in their last section game, and they finished in second place. The tables are here.

In section B, Duncan Fernie and Frazer Hare finished with the same 4-1 win-loss record, both winning their final games. Fernie and team is ranked first over Hare because they won when they met earlier.

This means that in the quarterfinals Reid will meet Hare, and Murdoch will meet Fernie at 08.30 tomorrow, Sunday morning.

Here are a few photos from the Murdoch-Gyorgy Nagy game.

Hungarian discussion. Gyorgy Nagy and third player Zoltan Jakab.

Scottish discussion. Warwick Smith and David Murdoch.

David Murdoch

One will do nicely! Zoltan Jakab.

Warwick Smith

Team Murdoch seem surprised as Warwick meditates!

Hungarian front end in action.

"Peace!"

Gyorgy Nagy

"I liked that one!"

There was a fair bit of thought went into the fourth end, Murdoch counted two for a 4-1 lead, and the Scots were on their way. All the linescores are here.

Pics © Skip Cottage

One section game to go

2010-11-27T16:54:00.002Z

So, going into the penultimate section games, who's going to qualify? You can see for yourself if you look at the standings here. There are four sections of six teams, and two qualify from each for tomorrow's quarterfinals (08.30 if you want to come along to watch).

Section A has already one team through, that of Sandy Reid, Moray Combe, Scott McLeod and David Soutar. Unbeaten in four games, their result against Iain Watt would not have made a difference, and it was an evening off for Team Reid. Keith Prentice, David Murdoch and Gyorgy Nagy are still in contention. The webcast of the Murdoch - Nagy game is on now, here.

Section B sees Duncan Fernie, Frazer Hare, Neil Joss and Ewan MacDonald all in contention. Joss and Hare are playing each other in this final section game.

In section C, Hammy McMillan's team of David Smith, Ross Paterson and Sandy Gilmour is unbeaten after four games, and four of the other five teams are still in contention for the second qualifying place.

In section D, Alan Chalmers is top on three wins, with four other sides on two wins. We could be in for a longish evening as this gets sorted out!

Elvis is in the building

2010-11-27T15:35:00.004Z

OK, which one is Elvis? This is the front three of Marco Pascale's Italian side, and Elvis Molinero is the curler in the middle.

The King recorded quite a number of curling tracks. There was Baby let's play house, from 1955, (remixed by Spankox, 2007), Playing for keeps in 1956, Don't in 1957, It's now or never in 1960, C'mon everybody in 1960, Slowly but surely in 1965 (from the Tickle me EP), Spinout in 1966, Big Boss Man in 1967, Raised on rock in 1973 and T-R-O-U-B-L-E in 1975.

My favourite of course is the one that a curling team always sings to their skip as he/she goes to play the last draw to win the game - see here!

Here's Elvis!

Pics © Skip Cottage

Early Saturday

2010-11-27T10:58:00.012Z

It was just two years ago that I was complaining of the all-black bin bag look of so many of the Scottish men's teams at the Edinburgh International, see here. "Time for Scottish curling to emerge from the dark ages," I wrote. How things change. "Welcome to the pyjama party," was how I was greeted this morning! Team Logan Gray above.

John Hamilton's team are also members of the 'Pyjama Party'. I'm looking forward to reading their manifesto!

Our fashion correspondent was quick to note the hairstyle of Finnish third player Pauli Jaamies.

The Finns were up against the Graham Shaw team first thing this morning, in a game that went to an extra end. You can find all the scores and section standings here.

Andrew Reed's English side took Hammy McMillan's Euro representatives to an extra end this morning too, but the Scots counted the win in the ninth.

Paul Stevenson

Talking fashion, Alan Chalmers is sporting a custom-made Musketeers CC bunnet!

Lee McLeary

Check out the webcast here.

Pics © Skip Cottage

Last Post for Friday

2010-11-26T20:40:00.006Z

"Pssst. Want to know a secret?" Tom Brewster.

And here's Team Brewster all involved in a difficult decision.

Italy's Marco Pascale. Welcome to Edinburgh, Marco. I note that one of the Italian Team is called Elvis Molinero. My challenge is to get a photo of him tomorrow and then I can have another musical caption!

Marco was up against the strong Ewan MacDonald team tonight.

Logan Gray

... who doesn't look too happy in this pic from his game against the Czech team. (I think brother Lindsay had just missed!)

And this is Lindsay, on the right, sweeping with lead Ian Stobo.

Welcome to Edinburgh to David Sik, skip of the Czech Republic team.

The Czech front end.

All the results and standings are here. Back tomorrow!

Through the lens on Friday afternoon

2010-11-26T16:41:00.007Z

All the results and standings are here. Alan Smith and Iain Watt are doing the thinking in this pic!

A warm welcome to Andrey Drozdov's Russian team. That's Andrey above, against David Murdoch. Having lost his first game to Keith Prentice, Team Murdoch need to win this one, and they did, David having a cold draw with his last.

Here's the hard-working Murdoch front end, Ross Hepburn and Glen Muirhead, doing what hard-working front ends have to do!

Team Joss. The Hollies had the caption for this one, see here.

"OK, skip. Which brush do you want me to aim for?" Sandy Reid.

Richard Woods doing a good grey seal impersonation!

And here's his skip, Duncan Fernie, in their game against England's Jamie Malton.

It's quite hard to get a clean caption for this one. Gavin Fleming gets down for a look through Ewan MacDonald's legs!

Here's Ewan.

"Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me." Keith Prentice. Having been the giant killer in the first round this morning, when they beat Team Murdoch, the Prentice team gave up two against the head to lose to Sandy Reid in their second game.

Welcome to Edinburgh to the Hungarian team, skipped by Gyorgy Nagy, above.

Photos © Skip Cottage

First shots from Murrayfield

2010-11-26T13:27:00.004Z

Craig Reid, Scott Hamilton (skip), David Mundell and David Reid discuss options in a tricky last end against Logan Gray's side. They had last stone and needed two. With the hammer, Scott made a perfect draw to count a second and the win. You can find all the scores and standings here. There are four sections of six teams.

Here's Logan.

I don't think this pic is out of focus at all. This is team John Hamilton. Not Loudmouth these, but from another company - Wackpants - check them out here.

Hammy McMillan and his team of David Smith, Ross Paterson and Sandy Gilmour are having their last competitive outing before the Europeans, and they had the measure of Paul Stevenson's team this morning.

Hammy and David Smith watch as Dillan Perras calls line on his skip's shot.

There are five foreign teams in the draw this year, plus two English sides. This is Finnish skip Aku Kauste. Other visitors from Europe include Andrey Drozdov's Russians, Marco Pascale's Italians, David Sik's Czech Republic side, and Gyorgy Nagy's Hungarians.

Pics © Skip Cottage

Webcast ready

2010-11-26T11:48:00.004Z

Anyone wanting to experience some live action from the Edinburgh International? Alex Mitchell has the production hub ready for the first webcast of the day, at 1.50 pm, between Ewan MacDonald and Neil Joss. Commentators will be Logan Gray and Trevor Dodds.

Go here to view the webcast. All the results can be found here.

Seniors Underway

2010-11-24T17:40:00.014Z

The Edinburgh International Seniors got underway today. Sixteen teams are competing in four sections. The results are all here.

In the photo above, David Howard and Andy Robinson are the sweepers on Gordon Eadie's stone for the Ronnie Peat team, skipped today by Jean Lesperance.

And here's Jean.

Jean Lesperance and Andy Robinson watch as Marion Craig and Catherine Raeburn discuss options.

Marion Murdoch

Thirds in the head. Kay Gibb and Alastair Wood.

Jacqui Crawford

Isobel Waddell and Alan Durno

David Clydesdale.

Find all the results here.

Photos © Skip Cottage

Webcast schedule

2010-11-23T13:52:00.003Z

The draws for both the Edinburgh International Seniors Championship and the Edinburgh International Curling Championship have been out for some time now and are available on the website here.

We are providing a webcast service again this season and you may be interested to know that we will be covering the Friday 1.50pm game between Ewan MacDonald and Neil Joss and then the 7.15 game between David Murdoch and Sandy Reid.

On Saturday, we will be covering four sessions, 10.50am, 1.50pm, 4.10pm and 7.15pm. We will announce the games to be covered on the blog, but the 10.50 games between MacDonald and Fernie or Hare and Malton look tasty enough to attract our attention!

Please come back here for pictures of the events and further news on the webcast coverage.

Senior Championship Draw

2010-10-24T17:02:00.001+01:00

Running in parallel with the Edinburgh International, there is the popular Edinburgh International Senior Championships. This is a competition open to any four curlers over the age of 50. Over the years, the competition has attracted some of the finest “mature” curlers – men and women, or indeed, mixed – of their generation. Three years ago, the competition changed its format and timing to accommodate its sister competition being elevated to the ranks of the Champions Tour. The four leagues are now played on the Wednesday and Thursday prior to the main event with the top four teams from each of the leagues progressing to the High Road semi finals and the runners-up moving to the Low Road semi finals. These games are played on the finals Sunday and are run concurrently with the semi-finals and final of the Edinburgh International itself. The draw itself is on the main competition website here.

Former Scottish Senior Champion Skip, Ronnie Peat brings a strong team through from the west to compete in Section A. All are members of the Reform Curling Club and I am looking forward to seeing this section play out, because twice Scottish Senior Championship runner-up David Clydesdale brings his team back from Kinross to defend the title that he won last year. The two Marions, Murdoch of Lockerbie fame and Craig, who hails from a farm near East Kilbride, round out this strong section. No predictions here, by the way – they’re all chums!

In Section B, Michael Sutherland brings his team back across the border for another tilt at fifteen Scottish rinks! He is in a tough section, mind you and perhaps his biggest challenge comes from Sandy Nelson and his Kinross rink. Sandy himself has been a top performer on the Scottish circuit for more years than he will care to admit. Accurate on the big weight hit and deadly at the draws is Sandy! Judith Carr brigs a team down from Aberdeen and local boy and reasonably famous hotelkeeper and sponsor John Dignan skips the fourth team in this section.

In Section C, Colin Hamilton’s powerful local rink will face stiff opposition from Jeanette Johnston. Together, she and third Catherine Dodds won the European Curling Championships Silver Medal; we’ll draw a veil over when! Ace ice maker Andy McGlynn from Forfar skips a team and Linda Young is bringing an all-ladies team from Kinross in this section.

In Section D, Alan Durno, a perennial visitor from the frozen north has some serious competition from two strong all-ladies teams skipped by Jacqui Crawford and reigning Scottish Senior Ladies Champion, Isobel Waddell. My team mate on the Royal Club Centenary Canadian tour in 2003, Bob Smith, the famous chartered accountant, brings some chums from Fife over the bridge to do battle. Should be a fun section.

International draw throws up some interesting matches

2010-10-24T16:41:00.000+01:00

The draw for the 2010 Edinburgh International has been announced and appears on the competition website here.

As in years past, the competition has 24 entries. Each team has been put in one of four leagues and is guaranteed five games of curling. The top two teams from each of the four leagues progress forward to Sunday morning’s quarter finals. Thereafter, the event moves to straight knock-out culminating in the afternoon final at 2.30pm.

Last year’s winning skip, David Murdoch has a new team this year with reigning Scottish Champion Warwick Smith at third, young Glen Muirhead at second and old campaigner and three-time Scottish Champion Ross Hepburn at lead. Ross and Warwick won Bronze Medals at the recent World Championships. This will be the new team’s first competitive outing in Scotland and it will be interesting to see how well they gel together as a unit. They will have games against Keith Prentice and his team of past World Senior Champions. Keith. Lockhart Steele, Robin Aitken and Tommy Fleming are enjoying a glorious Indian summer in their curling careers, though were unfortunate to miss out on competing in the recent World Senior Championships in Russia; the volcanic ash cloud did for their travel plans! Robin Aitken, a member of the Edinburgh International Organising Committee, recently won the Scottish Senior Mixed Championships with fifth man Archie Craig.

The Murdoch v Prentice clash takes place on Friday morning at 08.30. They are both in Section A with former Scottish Junior Champion Sandy Reid, Iain Watt, a Hungarian team skipped by György Nagy and a Russian team skipped by Andrey Drozdov. I like the look of Sandy Reid’s team of Moray Combe, Scot McLeod and David Soutar, though you have to question David’s taste in trousers! Iain Watt has previous winner Alan Smith throwing thirds stones, Sandy Christie at two and reigning Scottish Junior Champion and World Junior Silver Medallist, Steven Mitchell at lead.

In section B, Ewan MacDonald brings his new team of Graeme Connal, Pete Loudon and Euan Byers to the party. His main challenge may very well come from Duncan Fernie, recently-crowned European Mixed Champion David Edwards at third, and the experienced front end of Richard Woods and Colin Campbell – immediate past European Mixed Champion – at lead. Their clash is at 10.50 on Saturday morning. Before that game though, Ewan has to face Stranraer’s Frazer Hare, who has Robbie Dick, Jamie Strawhorn and Don Frame in his team this year. England’s Jamie Malton, Italy’s young team from the Pinerolo area, skipped by Marco Pascale and Scotland’s Neil Joss are the other competing teams in this strong-looking group.

Section C has Stranraer’s doughty Hammy McMillan, who skips another past World Champion skip in Perth’s David Smith, the front end being former Scottish Junior Champions and World Bronze Medallists Ross Paterson and Sandy Gilmour. It is difficult to pick from the other five teams in this section. Finland’s Aku Kauste is a relatively unknown quantity; he and his team have featured in recent Finnish Championships. England’s Allan MacDougall is a former World Junior Champion skip – though at the time he was representing Scotland. He brings recent international form to the competition though; he and his mixed team made the semi-final stages of the European Mixed Championship at Greenacres before agonisingly losing his last two games to finish just outside the medals. John Hamilton skips Jamie Dick, Andrew Craigie and Graeme Copland; they had a disappointing season last season and will be looking to the Edinburgh International to kick-start their season. Local teams skipped by Murrayfield’s Paul Stevenson and – I almost used the word “doughty” again! - Graham Shaw will not let anyone win their matches against them easily.

Finally, section D looks tasty! Tom Brewster has put a new young rink together. It includes Greg Drummond and Michael Goodfellow – both of whom lost out in the final of the Scottish Junior Championship last season and both of whom enter the big, bad world of competitive curling wide-eyed and bushy-tailed. Actually – they were good enough to reach the final of the Scottish Championships as well as the Junior Championships. Warwick Smith finally won that game, but not before Glen Muirhead (who skipped Michael and Greg) had a bad pick-up that might have helped square things late on in the game. Scott Andrews, reigning Scottish Junior Champion and World Silver Medallist plays second stones in a strong-looking team. Logan Gray will fancy his chances with his new team as well. He has Alasdair Guthrie at third, brother Lindsay at second and Iain Stobo at lead. Lindsay is still eligible for the juniors but has elected to concentrate on the Scottish Championships this year. Logan and Alasdair are multiple Scottish Junior Champions, of course. Lee McCleary and David Sik were quarter-finalists in the competition last season and will be anxious to take their rinks a couple of stages further! Another former Scottish Junior Champion Scott Hamilton brings his new team to the event. Craig Reid, David Reid and Scott MacArthur look to me to be a strong team and I think that they might very well get out of this tough section. Local hero Alan Chalmers – I say “local”, but he now lives in Perth! – has been a long-time supporter of the event and brings Hamish Lorrain-Smith, Struan Macnee and EICC Organising Committee member Gordon Addison to the competition.

Who is my money on? Well – I am not a betting man, but if you want me to call it, I will go with the following eight teams in the quarter finals: Murdoch, Reid, Macdonald, Fernie, McMillan, Hamilton, Brewster and Gray. And earlier on I said that I thought that Scott Hamilton might get out of section D – how fickle am I?

There you go anyway – head on the block!

The Committee

2010-09-29T10:13:00.018+01:00

The Organising Committee for the 2010 Edinburgh International Curling Championship:

Trevor Dodds (Chair)
Trevor, a former Scottish Junior Champion and twice a winner of the Edinburgh International Curling Championship, has a long history of achievement in the sport. He was a member of the 2003 Royal Club Centenary Strathcona Cup Tour to Canada and regularly made it to the finals of the Scottish Championships, twice finishing second. He was fifth player in Colin Hamilton's Scottish-Championship winning team of 1994. He won the Scottish Pairs Championship in 1991 and has coached many teams in the Scottish Junior Championships.

This season, Trevor has been voted on to the board of the Royal Club as one of six elected directors. He will serve for at least three years. As a member of the board, Trevor now plays an active part in the governance of the sport in Scotland. Trevor is a member of the Oxenfoord and Carrington curling clubs.

Gordon Addison
Gordon is immediate past president of the Edinburgh curling club and is president of the Midlothian Province. Although now based in the east of Scotland, he hails originally from Douglas, a noted hotbed of curling in Lanarkshire. He is a member of the Corstorphine and Musketeer curling clubs. He is a court lawyer with a practice in Falkirk.

Robin Aitken (Umpiring)
Robin is the current Scottish Seniors Champion and has won Gold and Bronze Medals in the two World Senior Championships in which he has competed. Unfortunately, his attempt for a third World Medal was stymied by the Icelandic eruption earlier this year – certainly the Scottish team of which he was a member was amongst the favourites in the competition. Robin is a past winner of the Edinburgh International Curling Championship, taking the title in 1990. He is a member of the Athelstaneford curling club in East Lothian and is a past president of the East Lothian Province.

Iain Baxter (Ice Rink Facility)
Iain is a two-time former Scottish Champion, who won a Silver Medal in the World Championships in Megeve in 1971. He was a member of the 1993 Royal Club Strathcona Cup Tour to Canada and is currently a member of the Royal Club Area Standing Committee. He is the manager of Murrayfield Curling Rink and a member of Corstorphine and Watsonian curling clubs. Iain is a past president of the Edinburgh Curling Club.

Douglas Baxter (Ice Rink Facility and Website Coordinator)
Douglas brings some much-needed young blood onto the committee! He is the deputy manager of Murrayfield Curling Ltd and a member of Corstorphine curling club.

Robin Copland (Secretary)
Robin is a former Scottish Champion and two-time winner of the Edinburgh International. He was a member of the 2003 Royal Club Centenary Strathcona Cup Tour to Canada. He contributes a monthly blog to skipcottagecurling.blogspot.com and is the vice president of the Edinburgh curling club. He is a partner in Scotwork UK LLP, a negotiating skills training and consultancy partnership. Robin is a member of the Currie and Balerno, Corstorphine and Reform curling clubs.

John Dignan (Accommodation and Sponsorship)
John is a stalwart Edinburgh curler and a long-time sponsor of the sport. He is a past President of the Midlothian Province and a member of Corstorphine and Gogar Park curling clubs. John is Managing Director of the Best Western Braid Hills Hotel, one of the competition's main sponsors.

Ernest Prior (Programme)
Ernie is a board member of Murrayfield Curling Limited; he is a past president of the Edinburgh curling club and for many years was secretary of the club. Ernie is also a past president of the Midlothian Province. He is a member of the Corstorphine curling club.

Anne Marie Ross (Transportation)
Ann Marie is the current President of the Edinburgh curling club. She was a member of the Royal Club Ladies Tour to Canada in 2005. She is a member of Corstorphine Ladies curling club.

Ian Seath (Finance)
Ian is a Past President of both Edinburgh and Duddingston curling clubs. He is currently vice president of Musselburgh curling club. A keen historian, Ian has recently been a prime mover in the complete restoration of Thomson's Tower, Duddingston Curling Society's clubhouse, situated within Duddingston village, Edinburgh. He remains on the board of the Edinburgh curling club as the secretary.

Fund-raising dinner report

2010-09-23T20:46:00.002+01:00

The Edinburgh International Gala fund-raising dinner went ahead on Saturday, September 18, in the Edinburgh Curling Club rooms at Murrayfield ice rink. Event organiser Ian Seath reported back on a successful evening with over £1000 raised towards running the event. In the absence of a headline sponsor for this year’s event, every penny helps, so a warm 'thank you' to all the curlers who attended the evening.

Chairman Trevor Dodds chaired the evening and started the fun off with a repeat of last year’s successful 'heads and tails' game. Money was cajoled from guests and put in an envelope; Trevor had another envelope with £100 in it and the game commenced! You either put your hands on your head (Heads) or on your ... you’re beginning to get the picture! A coin was tossed and if your luck was in you stayed standing for the next round. Believe it or not, but it only took four tosses of the coin before Fiona Hardie, a guest all the way from Dumfries, was the last person standing and thus won the money.

Dinner was preceded by the Curlers’ Grace, delivered by event treasurer Ian Seath. After a sumptuous dinner provided by Bill Fleetham and his team - how they fed over seventy people at once from the Murrayfield kitchen remains a source of wonder and bewilderment - Alan Bain entertained the guests with some ribald stories from his days as captain of Lasswade Rugby Club. Alan’s wife, Jenny is, of course, the Junior Vice President of the Ladies' Branch of the Royal Club. She shared the top table with Alan, Trevor and his wife Catherine.

The dinner gave Edinburgh curlers the chance to get a quick glimpse of the ice pad. The ice technician team, under the leadership of ice rink manager Iain Baxter, has been hard at work over the past fortnight laying the ice in a series of shallow floods. The surface looked good and the circles and other markings looked pristine.

Top pic - Alan Bain and Trevor Dodds, courtesy of Robin Copland

Old video footage

2010-09-14T22:18:00.002+01:00

Paul Gowsell's Canadian team played in the 1985 Edinburgh International, sponsored that year by Weatherseal.

There's some old video footage for you to watch. Follow the link here. Enjoy!

Fund-raising dinner

2010-09-13T16:14:00.003+01:00

Plans for the Edinburgh International Gala fund-raising dinner on Saturday, September 18, are well underway and event organiser Ian Seath reports that there are only seven places left for what should be a fun-filled evening. Alan Bain will be the evening’s guest speaker and there will be a repeat of last year’s successful 'heads and tails' game.

The dinner gives Edinburgh curlers the chance to get together before the season starts for an evening of chat, reminiscing and looking forward to the winter ahead. Dinner guests will be helping the organising committee raise some much-needed funding to support the Edinburgh International Curling Championships, Edinburgh Curling Club’s premier event.

MENU

Tomato & Basil Soup with Crusty Bread
Duck Spring Rolls served with Plum Sauce

***
Pan Fried Chicken with Spring Onion
& Mushroom Sauce
Sweet Potato & Vegetable Curry with Rice
and Nan Bread (medium spiced)

(Served with Roasted Vegetables & New Potatoes)

***
Lemon Tart with Cranachan
Or Cheese & Biscuits

***
Coffee & Mints

Blog online for 2010

2010-08-21T21:54:00.001+01:00

The dates of the 2010 Edinburgh International Curling Championship are November 26-28.

Twenty-four teams will contest this Champions Tour event. These will be split into four sections of six teams. The top two from each section will qualify for quarterfinal places. Positions will be determined on points won. No team can go out of the competition without playing at least a four-end tie-break game.

The overall winning team will receive £4000; the runner up team will receive £2000; losing semifinalist teams will each receive £1000 and the losing quarter-finalist teams will receive £500.

Entry forms can be downloaded from here.

The Presentations

2009-11-29T23:24:00.005Z

Bill Marshall, the President of the Royal Caledonian Curling Club, presents the Edinburgh International Trophy to the David Murdoch team. L-R: Trevor Dodds (Chairman of the Organising Committee), Ewan MacDonald, David Murdoch, Bill Marshall, Peter Smith and Euan Byers. (Click on the photo to see it in a larger size)

The runners-up with the Berne Bear. L-R: Colin Campbell, Richard Woods, Logan Gray and Peter Loudon.

Pics by Bob.

The Seniors

2009-11-29T22:49:00.006Z

John Dignan presents the Edinburgh International Seniors Championship trophy to the David Clydesdale team. L-R: Jim Taylor, Douglas Rodger, David Clydesdale (skip) and Alistair Wood.

Clydesdale's team beat Sandy Nelson, Willie Paterson, Willie Stevenson and Jim Brownlie 9-7 in the final.

David Clydesdale and Sandy Nelson in the final.

Final action.

Alastair and David discuss options.

The Nelson team await developments!

David joins in with the sweeping.

Clydesdale had beaten Alan Durno in the semifinal, and Nelson had defeated Bill Cleghorn. You can find all the results and linescores here.

Pics by Bob

The Final

2009-11-29T17:17:00.005Z

Here it is, the trophy awarded to the winners of the Edinburgh International Championship.

And it was David Murdoch, Ewan MacDonald, Peter Smith and Euan Byers who won the trophy this afternoon, counting two in the last end to win 7-6 against the Peter Loudon team. The competition's main sponsor was Belhaven Best.

The linescore is here.

The two skips, David Murdoch and Pete Loudon.

Pete Loudon, Logan Gray, Richard Woods and Colin Campbell played a great game. It really was a high class game of curling from both teams. Here, Richard and Colin work on Logan's stone.

Pete and Logan 'in conference'!

David, with Richard and Colin behind.

Euan, Ewan, Dave and Pete

Dave has a 'wee think'!

Richard, Logan and Colin have a 'big think'!

Euan and Pete on Ewan's stone.

"What do you think, Dave?"

"Please sweep hard!" Pete

Totally involved. Richard and Colin.

Pete delivers with the front end ready to pick up the sweeping.

David

A hard working Euan and Ewan!

The two skips

Pat Edington performs a measure.

Richard has a little lie down during the game!

Presentation photos and Seniors event somewhat later when I get home to Skip!

Semifinals in summary

2009-11-29T13:39:00.004Z

David Murdoch had an open hit to win his semifinal against Tom Brewster. He played a lightish weight tap back, got the stone, but rolled out.

Given the same opportunity at the extra, Murdoch was right on target for a 4-3 win and a place in the final.

David Smith, with Warwick playing last stones, got a two in the seventh end to narrow the score against Peter Loudon's side but still trailled 4-5 in the eighth. With lots of stones in play, Warwick could not get his last stone hidden. Pete didn't need to play his last. Team Loudon was in the championship game.

It would be a Loudon v Murdoch final!

You can find the linescores here.

Faces of McCleary

2009-11-29T11:47:00.005Z

"I've no fingernails left!"

Lee McCleary skipped his team in the quarters, and just lost out to Team Murdoch. Good show. He's the blog's 'Curler of the Day'!

"I wonder."

"Now if you had just got it around there, Robbie."

"I'm keeping my fingers off the ice!"

"I just canna look at you anymore, Robbie."

In serious mode.

"My head hurts, Robbie."

"It's a problem with a molar at the back."

"I'll just do a wee Ricky Gervais impression."

"Having been sacked by my team, I'll have a try at a new profession!" Robin Copland and Lee McCleary commentate on the Murdoch - Brewster semifinal.

Photos by Bob

Quarterfinals

2009-11-29T10:52:00.008Z

Sunday morning at the Edinburgh International Championship. David Murdoch's side got past Lee McLeary's team in the quarters, just! Murdoch had to cut the edge of the four foot with last stone of the game and he was perfectly played.

Find all the linescores here.

David Smith skips the Warwick Smith team, and plays third stones.

Here's the Smith side in action against David Sik's team in the quarters.

It was just not to be for the Sik team. Nothing went right. The Czechs failed to take their chances, then had a pick up when trying to tap back for a five, and are heading home early!

Pete Loudon

Richard Woods and Colin Campbell work on Pete's stone as they work to a win over the defending champions.

Here's Pete again.

And Andy Kapp's popular team is out!

Tom Brewster. The Brewster side got past Ross Paterson in the quarters.

Here's Ross.

Semifinals:
Loudon v Smith
Brewster v Murdoch

Pics by Bob

Who qualified?

2009-11-28T20:28:00.008Z

You can find all the linescores and standings here. When the dust had settled tonight, the lineups for the quarterfinals, at 08.30 tomorrow (Sunday) were as follows:

David Murdoch (top section A) will play Lee McLeary (2nd section B)

Warwick Smith (top section B) will play David Sik (2nd section A)

Tom Brewster (top section C) will play Ross Paterson (2nd section D)

Peter Loudon (top section D) will play Andy Kapp (2nd section C)

The photo above is of Sebastian Robillard, expat Canadian, and Ross Paterson. Robillard with his international mix of Antonio de Mollinedo, Thomas Due and Sander Roelvaag lost his last round game to Ross Paterson skipping the Hammy McMillan team in the skip's absence, with Philip Wilson, Sandy Gilmour and Colin Dick. That set up a rematch of the two teams in the only tiebreaker of the evening. Paterson won that 3-1.

Sebastian Robillard

Photos by Bob

Saturday.... where are we?

2009-11-28T17:11:00.008Z

All four sections have one more game to play, and who's going to qualify is becoming clearer.

In Section A, David Murdoch's side remain undefeated and are safely through to the semifinals. David Sik (one loss), and Iain Watt (two losses) are still in contention. See the standings here. Murdoch plays Sik, and Watt plays Glen Muirhead in the final round.

Section B has Warwick Smith undefeated. Lee McCleary (one loss) and Andrey Drosdov (two losses) are still in contention. McLeary plays Thomas Dufour, and Smith is against Drosdov.

In Section C Tom Brewster's team is undefeated. Andy Kapp has lost one game. John Jo Kenny and Colin Hamilton are not out of it, even with two losses. Hamilton plays Brewster, Kenny plays Kapp (this is really the key game).

Section D has Peter Loudon's team at the top, undefeated. Sebastian Robillard's team have lost one game. Tomi Rantamaki and Philip Wilson are on two wins. Loudon plays Rantamaki, Wilson plays Robillard.

Top pic is of Colin Hamilton

What's hanging at Murrayfield?

2009-11-28T15:42:00.004Z

Murrayfield Ice Rink, in the scenic mountain scenery of West End Edinburgh!

The rink is dominated by this large flag. It is a representation of the arms of the City of Edinburgh!

Then there's the clock. This came from the old Haymarket Ice Rink and probably dates from around 1912. It was saved by Ronnie Malcolm, former manager of the Murrayfield rink. It has to be wound up by hand by a member of staff every three days or so! Keeps good time too.

And here is the aforementioned Ronnie, coping with the aftermath of a Water of Leith flood which inundated the rink!

Did you know the Murrayfield rink is the busiest in Scotland?

And this is what we do to famous Scottish curlers. L-R: WK Jackson (Olympic gold medallist, 1924), Mark Sanderson, Gilbert McClung.

And then there are the commentators. Keith MacLennan and Edith Loudon. These are not bronze. Find the webcast link here.

Pics by Bob

Latvian adventurers

2009-11-28T13:42:00.005Z

I've had a couple of emails from friends we made on our Latvian adventures with the Reform Club recently, so here is a Black Balsam toast to the Gulbis team at the Edinburgh International Curling Championship. Team of the Day! Above, Ainars Gulbis and Normunds Sarsunds.

Aivars Avotins plays lead.

Normunds Sarsuns, the second

Ainars Gulbis, third

Ritvars Gulbis

Quiet and well spoken!

Cheers! I'll have blackcurrant with mine.

For the record, the Latvians have had a rough time and are winless in three games. But it's all good practice for them on their way to the Le Gruyere European Championships next week.

Pics by Bob

Saturday's captions

2009-11-28T13:20:00.004Z

"I'm just cooling them down, and I'll be there in a minute!" Andy Kapp

"Did you see where our skip went?" David Edwards and Gordon Muirhead

"NO papparazzi! NO photos. I have a contract with Hello magazine!" Lockhart Steele

"Ouch. This ice is fair hurting my hand!" Logan Gray

"I'm going to close my eyes for a second or two while my team figure out what to do." Colin Campbell, Richard Woods and Pete Loudon.

Results and standings are here.

Saturday morning

2009-11-28T12:16:00.006Z

Good morning, and an apology for the lateness of the post. No, I didn't sleep in. There's just been a few hiccups on the connection front. Anyway, thanks to Alex Mitchell who came to the rescue, the blog is now connected to the world again.

It was the third game for the Peter Loudon team, and they won this morning. So they are the only undefeated team in Section D. All the results and standings are here.

Here Pete sorts out Colin Campbell and Richard Woods!

Tom Brewster's side are undefeated in Section C.

Here they are in action, Duncan Fernie and David Edwards work on Tom's stone.

Italian sweeping power!

But the Scots were too strong for the Joel Retornaz's side, just.

Andy Kapp's team are also undefeated in Section C after three games.

More to come.

Friday's Award

2009-11-27T23:50:00.000Z

And the award for 'Colourful Curler of the Day' goes to......... Scott Macleod.

Scott is a member of the Sandy Reid team, alongside Moray Combe and David Soutar. He's President of the Scottish Universities Curling Association this season, and you can see how he used to look by clicking here. We like his new image! For those of us with little hair, we are just jealous!

Friday's last post

2009-11-27T22:45:00.000Z

So, what's the position at the Edinburgh International Championship, sponsored by Belhaven Best, at the end of play tonight?

The six teams in sections C and D have played two rounds. Peter Loudon is the only side to have won both in D. Tom Brewster and Andy Kapp (the holders) have both won two games in Section C.

The teams in Sections A and B had three games today. In Section A David Murdoch came from behind, scoring two in the eighth to beat the Iain Watt team, to stay undefeated. David Sik (that's him above) also came through against Sandy Reid to finish the day on three wins!

Warwick Smith and Lee McCleary met in the third round of Section B. Both were undefeated. And it was Team Smith which remained unblemished with a 5-2 win over the McCleary four.

Warwick Smith

Lee McCleary

Find the linescores and standings here.

Bob's Team of the Day

2009-11-27T18:27:00.007Z

Right, this is my team of today - Andrey Drosdov's Russian side. Why this choice? Well, with the World Seniors and Mixed Doubles heading for Chelyabinsk later this season, why not?

This is skip Andrey Drostov.

This is the front end, Artem Bolduzev and Alexander Kirikov.

This is third player, Alexey Stukalsky

Alexander Kirikov

Artem Bolduzev

Here's Artem's delivery

Andrey Drosdov

Alexander

Alexey

And a caption competition!

And how are they doing in the competition? Not so good today, with losses against Lee McCleary and Thomas Dufour. And you can find the linescores and results here.

Pics by Bob.

Friday's smile

2009-11-27T17:10:00.008Z

"Don't look now, but.........."

"My skip told me to put a plug in it."

"I've been growing this for three weeks and it's still itchy."

"I do wish these two would stop going on so.... and I can have some quality zzzzzzs'"

"Oh Dave, I just canna take it any more!"

"I'll just have un petit nibble."

Other captions are available. Can you do better. Pics by Bob.

Friday's second post

2009-11-27T14:30:00.009Z

Andy Kapp is back to defend the title his team won last year.

Here are the Kapp team in action against Graham Shaw, the Germans winning in an extra end!

Ritvars Gulbis and his Latvian team lost out at an extra end to Philip Wilson.

And here is Philip.

Tom Brewster and Robin Gray. John Jo Kenny is skipping and Robin playing last stones for the Irish.

Joel Retornaz's Italians

Tomi Rantamaki from Finland is here!

The results can be found here, or here.

First on the ice on Friday

2009-11-27T12:03:00.011Z

Team Murdoch is here. This is Euan Byers.

David Murdoch. Team GB are on the board with a first round win over Jamie Malton's English side.

It got quite tense at times!

England's Keith Wilson and Michael Opel

Ewan MacDonald calls line for his skip's stone, as Jamie Malton and Michael Opel watch behind.

Jamie Malton

The Russians are here. This is Andrey Drosdov.

Jamie Dick was up against the French, skipped by Thomas Dufour.

David Sik, Czech Republic

David Smith and Adrian Meikle (Wales)

Sandy Reid and Glen Muirhead

Greg Drummond and Glen Muirhead

Iain Watt

Find all the results here.

Photos by Bob

International underway

2009-11-27T09:06:00.003Z

We're off! Play begins/began in the Edinburgh International Championship, sponsored by Belhaven Best, at 9.30 this morning.

Photos soon. But in the meantime here is the press release from the Curling Champions Tour.

Thursday update from Murrayfield

2009-11-26T17:44:00.007Z

Just a quick round up from the Edinburgh International Seniors. John Paul and Mike Watt of Team Durno watch their skip's stone in their last section game against defending champion Michael Sutherland. Michael contrived to steal a two in the last end to win the game, but goes through to the Low Road this year. We will have a new Senior Champion team!

Despite the loss, Durno qualified for the High Road, and plays David Clydesdale in Sunday's semifinals.

Here's a shot of the Clydesdale team. Douglas Rodger shows body language we are all familiar with as he marshalls his skip's stone down the ice. The Clydesdale team are through to the High Road playoffs.

The other High Road teams are those skipped by Bill Cleghorn and Sandy Nelson.

All the results and standings are here.

This is not my photograph. It is a screenshot from the webcasting trials that were held this afternoon. Good quality. Go to the event website here tomorrow, to find the link to the webcast.

Pics by Bob

Edinburgh at its best

2009-11-26T13:29:00.006Z

Edinburgh was looking its best today as the international teams arrive for the Edinburgh International Curling Championship, sponsored by Belhaven Best. The funfair is ready for all the curlers to enjoy.

Blitzen and the boss were greeting visitors at the Christmas market on Princess street.

Even the locals were enjoying the market!

Of course, there will be little time for shopping this weekend as the action will be continuous at the Murrayfield rink.

The transportation committee have added some innovations this year.

And the trams will be running along Princes Street. Well, perhaps not, although the buses will apparently be back on November 29. (Oops, wrong blog!)

And an alternative ice rink venue is on standby in Princes Street Gardens. The organising committee has thought of everything this year!

Pics by Bob

Nutrition for healthy athletes

2009-11-26T11:54:00.000Z

With the Seniors event in full swing, last minute preparations were in hand with just a day to go before the start of the Edinburgh International Curling Championship at 09.30 tomorrow (Friday).

Above: An important delivery of the sponsor's product!

Below: Alex Mitchell begins the setup for the webcasting, see here and here.

Pics by Bob

Snapshots from the Seniors

2009-11-25T21:03:00.008Z

You can find all the results from the Edinburgh International Seniors Championship here. Here are just a few pics as a taster!

Last year's winner Michael Sutherland (on right) was up against Iain Hamilton in the first round.

The Welsh are here. This is Hugh Meikle.

Jean Robertson's team were the second best in their game against Durno.

Linda Young was substituting for her other half, Willie.

We think the caption refers to the brush, not Michael Sutherland himself, but we could be wrong!

Judy Mackenzie

John Dignan's Best Western Braid Hills Hotel is the main sponsor of the Seniors event. And he is competing in the event too!

Alan Durno was in fine form in his game against Jean Robertson.

Sandy Nelson's team in action.

Janice Manson

Michael Burton and Jim Jamieson, from the Ronnie Peat team.

Kirsty Letton, Judy Mackenzie, Anne MacDougall and Pat Orr model their new uniforms!

Sixteen teams are playing in four sections. The round robin concludes tomorrow (the draw is here) and the semifinals and finals will be held alongside the Edinburgh International playoffs on Sunday.

Pics by Bob

Seniors championship gets underway

2009-11-25T00:09:00.001Z

The Edinburgh International Seniors Championship gets underway at 10.00 today. The draw is here.

Find the results of the games here.

McMillan withdraws

2009-11-23T17:58:00.003Z

In a late development, Hammy McMillan has pulled out of the international event as he is coaching his son’s team in an under-21 event in Thun.

Former GB Olympian, Philip Wilson, will now skip Team McMillan. Ross Paterson and Sandy Gilmour will also play, though we do not yet know who will step up to the breach in Hammy’s absence.

Look out on these pages for pictures from both the seniors and from the Edinburgh International. Follow this link to the event website for webcasts. The earlier blog here gives transmission times. Please note the time difference (one hour) between CET and UK time.

The seniors event draw is here. Play begins on Wednesday.

The international event draw is here. Play begins on Friday.

Edinburgh is the next Champions Tour event

2009-11-19T09:38:00.005Z

It all gets underway next week! The Edinburgh International Seniors begins on Wednesday, November 25, and the Edinburgh International Championship will be on at the Murrayfield Rink, November 27-29.

What a season that Thomas Ulsrud of Norway is having on the Curling Champions Tour! He is uncatchable at the top of the table having won an astonishing Can$62,436. The table is here. Edin and Stöckli are having strong seasons as well and their positions at the top of the table will not be challenged next weekend. It would have been nice to have Ulsrud, Edin and Stöckli compete in Edinburgh, which is the next Champions Tour event, there is enough going on elsewhere in the table to make the weekend’s proceedings interesting.

With Can$7,500 going to the winning team in the competition, there are a number of competing teams that can make a big move up the table. World and European Champions Team Murdoch have had a quiet start to the season by their own standards, but began to show some form in the recent Lucerne tournament, reaching the semi final stages of the competition before losing out to the all-conquering Ulsrud. The team is bubbling nicely towards top form for the European Championships, so I expect them to feature strongly in the Edinburgh International – a competition that David has won before. In the event of a Murdoch victory, they would move immediately from 6th to 4th in the overall table.

Team Kapp could also make a major move up the league if they repeat last year’s victory. A win, for example would take them from 9th to at least 5th and potentially even 4th. Andy has a strong team with him this year. Andy Lang, Holger Hoehne and Andreas Kempf return and the team has been strongly tipped to medal not only at the European Championships but at the Olympic Games as well.

Team Loudon, with Logan Gray, Richard Woods and recently-crowned European Mixed Champion Colin Campbell, hover in the top 15. Skip Pete Loudon has been around the block a few times and has been a regular skip in the final stages of the Scottish Championship these past few years. In Logan Gray, he has a talented player at third – destined perhaps for great things. He is a three-time Scottish Junior Champion and appears regularly on the Champions Tour – either as a player or as a commentator. Fifth place in the overall league is within their grasp depending how well they – and how badly others – perform.

Two other hardy Scottish competitors, Warwick Smith (that's him in the photo above) and Hammy McMillan hover in the wings. Hammy and Philip Wilson bring their young front end of Ross Paterson and Sandy Gilmour for another crack at the title. Warwick’s team, Scottish Champions only three seasons ago, are still up for the challenge. They would all of them love to win the Scottish Championship and have another crack at the World Championships. David Smith is just one Scottish title (he has nine), behind his brother Pete’s all-time record of ten.

A win in the Edinburgh International for either of these two teams would catapult them up the Champions Tour League table and kick start their seasons.

It is at the bottom end of the table, mind you, where the biggest moves can be made. A good weekend for any of Teams Dick (Scotland), Śik (Czech Republic), Due (Norway), or Retornaz (Italy) could move them from the obscurity of the late twenties in the table to the giddy heights of the top ten.

Now – there’s a thought to warm the cockles of a cold winter’s heart!

Robin Copland

Warwick Smith's photo is © Skip Cottage

Edinburgh International Commentary Team

2009-11-04T21:55:00.004Z

I have been scouring the highways and byways of Scotland in an effort to come up with some commentators to add colour and insight to the games we plan to webcast during the Championship. Expect some controversy, some laughs, some explanation, but, perhaps above all, lots of passion! The people we have lined up have 'an opinion'! You may not agree with their take and their views, but they will express them honestly, passionately and with spirit! What more would you want? Of course, it is always interesting for the viewer to analyse what the commentator says and then compare it with their own thoughts on what might happen next as an exciting end develops. It’s the debate and the exchange that makes our sport such an exciting one for the aficionado.

Curling is surely the most tactical of games, is it not? Its pace of play allows for discussion on the bleachers or in the bar. Hopefully the commentators that we have lined up will be able to act as your guide and mentor as games unfold. You might not like what we say; search for the 'mute' button on your laptop if it all gets too much!

The commentators will have the Scottish Curling Forum (www.scottishcurlingforum.co.uk) open in front of them throughout the webcasts, so will have a direct and interactive link with their viewers.

Sheila Swan is a former World Ladies Champion Gold-medallist and multiple winner of the Scottish Ladies Championship. She is currently the National Disability Curling Officer in Scotland and is a highly-respected coach; she was in charge of the Sarah Reid team that famously broke Scotland’s ten-year Gold Medal duck in World Junior Ladies Curling Championships three years ago.

Kenny Edwards is a former two-times Scottish Junior Champion and World Junior Championship Bronze medallist. He hails from one of Scotland’s curling hotbeds, Lockerbie, the home rink of many world-class curlers, the most famous of whom is David Murdoch. Kenny reads the game really well and has an uncanny knack of calling the right shot. He is also famously trenchant in his views on curling and its future. Expect some fireworks when Kenny is on the mike!

Keith MacLennan is a jovial soul who loves his curling and cares passionately about the sport and its future. He is no mug on the rink, having won a Scottish Junior Curling Championship in what many still believe was as fine a tactical skip’s performance in a Scottish Junior Championship Final as ever there has been in recent years. He proved that was no 'flash in the pan' by winning the Scottish Mixed Doubles Championship with Vicky Sloan last season. He is a regular traveller to European bonspiels, so is well known on the Continent. Like Kenny, Keith has a forensic eye for the game; in addition, he is bound from time to time to let rip at perceived injustices in the curling world. He is, above all, a great team man and you will enjoy his insight.

Bob Kelly will commentate occasionally, if his duties as coach and fifth man for Team Loudon allow. Bob is a regular commentator on Eurosport, so we are honoured to have him appear – even if fleetingly – in the commentary box for our webcasts. Bob is a former Scottish Junior Champion and a three-time Scottish Champion. He is a multiple winner of events on the Scottish Domestic circuit and has recently been elected on to the Royal Club Board. He has forgotten more than the rest of us ever knew about the sport, so will be an insightful member of the commentary team.

Robin Copland is a former Scottish Champion and twice winner of the Edinburgh International. He currently writes a monthly column for the Scottish Curler magazine and is the secretary of the Organising Committee of the Edinburgh International.

Edith Loudon is a multiple Scottish Ladies Champion, who has medalled at three European Championships and who was in Kirsty Hay’s team that came so close to making the final at the 1998 Nagano Winter Olympics. She was fifth player on Jackie Lockhart’s Gold Medal winning team in Bismark in 2002, so has plenty of top-level curling experience. She is now giving back to the sport by serving as an elected representative on the World Curling Federation.

Robin Copland

Webcast plans for the Edinburgh International Curling Championships

2009-11-03T15:55:00.004Z

Trevor Dodds, Chair of the Organising Committee, today revealed the schedule for a series of webcasts from the Championships. To reflect interest from Europe, there will be a number of overseas teams featured in the showcase games, as well as local talent. Here is the proposed schedule:

Day Time (UK) Game
Friday 12.00 Andy Kapp (Germany) v Graham Shaw
Friday c15.30 David Śik (Czech Republic) v Glen Muirhead (last four ends)
Friday 18.00 Hammy McMillan v Pete Loudon
Friday 20.30 David Murdoch v Iain Watt
Saturday 11.30 Thomas Dufour v Warwick Smith
Saturday 14.00 Tom Brewster v Andy Kapp
Saturday 17.30 David Murdoch v David Śik
Saturday 19.30 to be decided
Sunday 11.30 one semi final
Sunday 14.30 final

Andy Kapp, as defending champion, is given pride of place in the Friday lunchtime game against Graham Shaw. Graham and his team have been regulars on the Scottish competitive circuit and will ensure that Andy does not get it all his own way! It will be good though to see Andy’s European and Olympic team at Murrayfield again and he will be putting up a sterling defence of his crown.

David Śik delighted us last season with the quality of his play, so we have chosen his game against Glen Muirhead to showcase in the afternoon session. We will be webcasting the last four ends of the game. Glen is a two-times Scottish Junior Champion and comes, of course, from a long line of curlers. His father, Gordon, is a past Scottish Champion and World Silver medallist; his sister, Eve is a three-time World Junior Champion and the GB Olympic skip. Glen himself is a fine young curler and this should be an interesting match.

Saturday evening’s game pitches Hammy McMillan, Philip Wilson, Ross Paterson and Sandy Gilmour against Hammy’s lead in his World Championship-winning 1999 rink, Pete Loudon, who has Logan Gray, Richard Woods and recently-crowned European Mixed Championship Gold Medallist, Colin Campbell, in his team. An interesting sub plot here is that Sandy and Ross were both in Logan’s first (of three) Scottish Junior Championship winning rink. They famously went through the round-robin in Pinerolo that year undefeated before losing out to Canada in a cruel semifinal knock-out game.

We could not let Friday pass without taking a look at current World and European Champion rink, skip David Murdoch, third Ewan MacDonald, second Pete Smith and lead Euan Byers. They will face Iain Watt’s talented team of former Edinburgh International winning skip Alan Smith, Steve Mitchell and Andrew Dolman.

On Saturday morning at 11.30, it is time to have a look at Thomas Dufour, the new French curling hope. He is taking on Warwick Smith, David Smith, Craig Wilson and Ross Hepburn. This foursome won the Scottish Championship as recently as two years ago and Warwick and Dave are both former World Champions. There is nothing that these guys like more than winning curling matches, so Thomas had better be aware that he is in for a bit of a game!

I like the look of the Andy Kapp v Tom Brewster lunchtime match up on Saturday. Both like to play an attacking game and both teams have the shotmakers to turn hope and aspiration into reality! Tom recently skipped Scotland to a Gold Medal in the European Mixed Championship, his second Gold Medal in that event, and in Duncan Fernie, he has one of the finest shotmakers in Scotland today. Brother Ron Brewster and new lead for this season, David Edwards – more used to skipping than leading these past few seasons and, indeed, a former winning skip in the Championship – make up a strong-looking front end. Andy and his team need no introduction; they have regularly featured in the latter stages of international competitions and have dominated German curling for the past decade. Andy himself was fifth man in the World Championships in Milwaukee – and that was twenty years ago! No lack of experience here, then!

On Saturday at 17.30, and assuming that it is still a meaningful game, we plan to have a look at David Śik against David Murdoch. This game will pitch raw, untapped talent against world class experience. Team Murdoch may have made a slow start to season 2009-10, but please do not be lulled into a false sense of security. As they move towards their first 'Major' of the season, they will be slipping into top gear. They will be tapering towards a major effort in Aberdeen, a first European Championship for most of them on home soil and the defending champions to boot. Expect a major effort from them!

As the league sections move towards their close, we will cover appropriate games and, of course, there will be full coverage of the semifinals and final. Keep your eyes on the blog here for any changes or revisions to the schedule.

Robin Copland

International Draw Online

2009-10-26T14:44:00.006Z

The draw for the Edinburgh International Curling Championship, sponsored by Belhaven Best, is now available and can be seen here.

Twenty-four teams play in four sections, the first games scheduled for 09.30 on Friday, November 27. Two qualifiers will go forward from each section to the quarterfinals and each of the sections looks tough and will provide the teams with a pretty rigorous workout. Each team, of course, is guaranteed five games of top-class curling on ice that has been consistently swingy in the first month of the new season.

Current champion, Andy Kapp and his German team face local teams Brewster, Shaw and veteran Colin Hamilton as well as the Irish team skipped by JohnJo Kenny and the Italians, skipped by Joel Retornaz. I suspect that the 2.00pm Saturday draw will give the neutral an important game to watch in that section; Andy Kapp plays Tom Brewster in what could well be the decider for first and second place in the section.

Reigning European and World Champions, Team Murdoch, have had a slow start to their season so far. Mind you, they make a habit of peaking at the right time and winning the major Championships. The Edinburgh International falls neatly the week before the upcoming European Championships, so I expect them to be approaching peak condition in Edinburgh. They meet England's Jamie Malton, Michael Opel, Henry Carter and Keith Wilson in the opening draw of the competition. But maybe their toughest competition will come from young Glen Muirhead, who showed so well in last season’s Scottish Championship. Glen brings a revised team from last season, but with Michael Goodfellow and Thomas Sloan as new team members, they will be up for the challenge. The Murdoch v Muirhead clash takes place at 11.30 on Saturday morning.

Warwick Smith is perhaps favourite to progress from his group though the section does look wide open. Jamie Dick is taking some time to get it together with his new rink and will be anxious to do better than he has up until now. French and Russian Champions Dufour and Drosdov are also in this section. Adrian Meikle had a good win against Dick in the Hamilton Mini Tour event and will be keen to repeat his win while Lee McCleary will also be up for things.

Perhaps the toughest looking section is D, where local star, Pete Loudon, faces some stiff foreign competition from Due (Norway), Rantamäki (Finland) and Gulbis (Latvia). But lurking in the background, lying in wait for all-comers, is Hammy McMillan, who returns with his strong team of last season. Former GB Olympic curler, Philip Wilson plays third stones and former Scottish Junior Champions, Ross Paterson and local boy Sandy Gilmour make up the front end.

That's Ritvars Gulbis in the photo above. The Latvian skip brings his team to this Curling Champions Tour event in Edinburgh, en route to the European Championships in Aberdeen. The Latvians are up against Hammy McMillan in their first match at noon on Friday, November 27.

Robin Copland

Pic © Skip Cottage

Seniors Draw now online

2009-10-10T11:04:00.006+01:00

The draw for the Edinburgh International Senior Curling Championship, November 25-29, has been made and has thrown together some intriguing games in the league sections.

The competition will be run in four sections of four teams with league games taking place on Wednesday 25 and Thursday 26 November. The winners of each section qualify for the semifinals of the competition. The runners-up will qualify for the consolation event semifinals. All semifinals will take place on Sunday, November 29, at 11.30.

The two finals will go ahead in parallel with the Edinburgh International Final at 3.00pm the same day.

Section A contains Kirsty Letton and her strong Glasgow team. They are former Scottish and World Senior Champions and will provide a stern test for Jimmy Green, Hugh Meikle and local man, John Dignan.

Section B sees Sandy Nelson’s strong Kinross team face former Scottish Senior Champion, Ronnie Peat, as well as the wily Walter Brown and Janice Manson.

Section C looks competitive. David Clydesdale, runner-up in the Scottish Seniors last season will make a strong push for the number one spot, but Ian Gillespie and Bob Smith bring strong teams to the event and Ken Watson has local knowledge in his favour!

If you want my tip for the most competitive section, though, look no further than section 4! Alan Durno brings his marauders down from the north; Iain Hamilton has been curling on Edinburgh ice since Moses was but a gleam in his faither’s e’e; Jean Robertson will provide feisty opposition and Michael Sutherland returns from over the border to defend his title. The sparks will fly!

The first league games take place at Murrayfield on Wednesday 25 November at 10.00am. For the full draw, check out this link.

Robin Copland

Top photo is of Michael Sutherland in last year's final © Skip Cottage.

Teams announced for Edinburgh International

2009-10-08T10:23:00.002+01:00

Andy Kapp (above) will bring his team to Edinburgh to defend the trophy he won last year. The Edinburgh International, sponsored by Belhaven Best, is a Curling Champions Tour event, and will be held at the Murrayfield Rink, November 27-29, 2009. The lineup (correct as at October 8) is:

International teams:
Czech Republic - David Śik (with Milan Polívka, Marek David, Pavel Menśík)
Russia - Andrey Drosdov (with Artem Bolduzev, Alexey Stukalsky, Alexander Kirikov, Anton Kalalb)
Latvia - Ritvars Gulbis (with Ainars Gulbis, Aivars Avotins, Normunds Sarsuns)
England - Jamie Malton (with Michael Opel, Henry Carter, Keith Wilson)
Finland - Tomi Rantamäki (with Timo Patrikka, Jermu Pöllänen, Lauri Ikävalko)
Canada/Spain/Norway - Sebastian Robillard (with Antonio de Mollinedo, Thomas Due, Carlos Gonzales)
Germany - Andy Kapp (with Andy Lang, Holger Hoehne, Andreas Kempf, Oliver Axnick)
Ireland - Johnjo Kenny (with Robin Gray, Peter Wilson, Neil Fyfe, Bill Gray)
Wales - Adrian Meikle (with Stuart Hills, Andrew Tanner, John Sharpe)
France - Thomas Dufour (with Tony Angiboust, Richard Ducroz, Jan Ducroz, Raphael Mathieu)
Italy - Joel Retornaz (with Silvio Zanotelli, Davide Zanotelli, Julien Genre)

Scottish teams:
David Murdoch (with Ewan MacDonald, Pete Smith, Euan Byers)
Tom Brewster (with Duncan Fernie, Ron Brewster, David Edwards)
Warwick Smith (with Craig Wilson, David Smith, Ross Hepburn)
Peter Loudon (with Logan Gray, Richard Woods, Colin Campbell)
Graham Shaw (with Sandy Christie, Robin Niven, Mike Niven)
Lee McCleary (with Jim Strang, Robbie Stevenson, Ross McCleary)
Glen Muirhead (with Greg Drummond, Thomas Sloan, Michael Goodfellow)
Colin Hamilton (with Mike Dick, David Ramsay, Sean Murphy)
Iain Watt (with Alan Smith, Steve Mitchell, Andy Dolman)
Keith Prentice (with Lockhart Steele, Robin Aitken, Tommy Fleming)
Jamie Dick (with John Hamilton, Andrew Craigie, Graeme Copland)
Hammy McMillan (with Philip Wilson, Ross Paterson, Sandy Gilmour)
Sandy Reid (with Moray Combe, Scott Macleod, David Soutar)

Here are a couple more photos from last year's Edinburgh International final.

Photos © Skip Cottage

The Committee Members

2009-10-05T23:04:00.004+01:00

Details of the Edinburgh International Championship committee have been posted online on the official competition website. The committee includes the following:

Trevor Dodds (Chairman)
Gordon Addison (Chair of Edinburgh Curling Club)
Robin Aitken (Umpiring)
Iain Baxter (Ice Rink Facility)
Douglas Baxter (Ice Rink Facility and Website Coordinator)
Robin Copland (Secretary)
John Dignan (Accommodation and Sponsorship)
Colin Hamilton (Competition and Draw)
Ernest Prior (Programme)
Anne Marie Ross (Transportation)
Ian Seath (Finance)

Read their profiles here.

Murrayfield rink opens for new season

2009-09-16T22:30:00.004+01:00

It's Wednesday, September 16, 2009. It's the day before the Murrayfield rink, which will host the Edinburgh International Championships in November, opens for the new season! Here Jean Graham puts the finishing touches to the paint job on the door to the rink.

During the season, the rink will be the busiest in Scotland. There are six scheduled sessions each day. Eighty-eight different clubs use the facility, and some 2000 curlers play there regularly. Manager Iain Baxter confirms, "It's the most curled rink in the country!"

The ice was in pristine condition today awaiting the first stones to be thrown! The Edinburgh International will be held November 27-29. Other major events headed for the rink this season are the Scottish Mixed Doubles Championship next month, October 23-25. And the Scottish Schools' Championship returns to the Edinburgh rink, March 19-21. The season will wind up on March 30.

Gala Dinner and Fun Evening

2009-09-13T17:54:00.008+01:00

On Saturday evening, supporters and friends of the Edinburgh International Curling Championship gathered together in the club rooms at the Murrayfield rink for a fundraising dinner.

The Edinburgh International Curling Championship Committee wish to thank its many sponsors including the Braid Hills Hotel, Belhaven Best, Murrayfield Curling Ltd and Edinburgh Curling Club Ltd. The Committee also thank everone who attended yesterday evening for their support. They invite all to come along to the rink to watch the best teams in Scotland and teams from across Europe competing for this year's Championship, November 27-29.

It was a great night! We were well fed and watered, and royally entertained.

Guests gather for the evening.

The trophies were on show.

The club rooms were full to capacity on the night.

The Championship Committee Chairman, Trevor Dodds, was in charge of the proceedings.

David B Smith was his usual sparkling form. Mind you there was the one about the swan, the duck, and the lawyer that I didn't understand at all!

Robin Copland stood in at short notice as the second speaker and was in fine form.

Trevor's better half, Catherine, failed to draw my number in the raffle.

And Robin Aitken gave the vote of thanks.

Here's the Committee. Back L-R: Ernie Prior, John Dignan, Robin Copland, Iain Baxter, Robin Aitken. Front: Ian Seath, Trevor Dodds, Anne Marie Ross (plus Colin Hamilton, not in the photo).

Pics by Bob Cowan

The Edinburgh International Senior Championship

2009-08-25T18:37:00.007+01:00

For many years now, the Edinburgh International Senior Championship has been run in parallel with the main event. The event has been a popular on the seniors circuit and many teams have returned year after year to compete, to renew old rivalries and to socialise.

The competition is open to all over the age of 50 as defined by the RCCC, so can be used by teams preparing for their Scottish Senior Championships. It is open to men, ladies and mixed teams and is run in an interesting format, necessitated it has to be said, by the new demands on ice preparation time of the main competition. The Seniors event is now run on the Wednesday and Thursday before the main competition. This year that's November 25-26, 2009.

Four sections of four teams fight it out in leagues, guaranteeing each team three games of curling. The top team from each of the leagues progresses to a high road semifinal, while the runners-up in each section progress to the low road semis. The semifinals and finals of the High and Low roads are played at the same time as the semifinals and finals of the main competition, enabling the older hands to share in some of the limelight and razzmatazz on finals day.

England’s Michael Sutherland returns to defend his trophy; Hugh Meikle from Wales has entered a strong-looking team of Chris Wells, Mike Yuille and Stewart Cairns. There are a number of strong Scottish teams standing between them and ultimate success. Stalwart and long-standing supporters of the competition like Iain Hamilton, Walter Brown, Ritchie Stewart and Jimmy Green will fancy their chances in their local ice rink. Alan Durno brings Peter Fraser, Willie Young and Mike Watt with him and, if nothing else, they will challenge the bar staff to keep up! Sandy Nelson from Kinross is always someone to look out for. David Clydesdale, also from Kinross and runner-up in last season’s Scottish Senior Championships is bringing a team. Ken Watson and Iain Gillespie make up the 'all-male' teams. Ian has the irrepressible 'Lawyer fae Lenzie', Charles Jackson, playing third stones for him. There will never be a dull moment in any game involving Charles!

Former Scottish Senior Champions Ronnie Peat, Jim Jamieson and Mike Burton, all members of Reform Curling Club, have drafted in Jean Lesperance at third in a strong looking team who could well go all the way.

The ladies are represented by former World Ladies Champion, Kirsty Letton with her usual team of Judy Mackenzie, Pat Orr and Anne MacDougall. Janice Manson, Fiona Turnbull and Jean Robertson will also compete.

Tips for the top? Well, Alan Durno might be just the man to take on all-comers, but there again, I suppose it might depend on how things stack up on the Wednesday night! Sandy Nelson is another who will feature strongly and would be a good tip for the semi finals. Kirsty Letton is a doughty campaigner and Ronnie Peat could also challenge.

Oh, but what about David Clydesdale’s chances? Never write him off!

The draw will appear on the official website www.edinburghinternationalcurling.com in the next fortnight and competition results will be posted on the website at the conclusion of each session.

Compiled by Robin Copland

Top photo: Last year's winners L-R Alan Collett, Frank Forrest, Jim Wood and Michael Sutherland (skip). Photo by Bob Cowan.

Who's coming to Edinburgh?

2009-08-16T10:03:00.004+01:00

Robin Copland provides an update on the entries received so far for the Edinburgh International Curling Championship.

There is an exciting looking field developing for this year’s Edinburgh International Curling Championship.

Already received from Scotland are entries from Teams Warwick Smith, Peter Loudon, Jamie Dick, Iain Watt, Graham Shaw, Colin Hamilton, Keith Prentice and Tom Brewster. David Murdoch’s GB Olympic team has entered the competition; they will use it as a final shakedown before representing Scotland in the European Championships in Aberdeen.

Team news is also interesting. Team Smith remains as last season and looks as competitive as ever. Warwick stays with Craig Wilson, Dave Smith and Ross Hepburn. All are multiple winners of the Scottish Championship; Warwick and Craig will be anxious to demonstrate that the Olympic selectors got it wrong when they overlooked their claims to be included in the final five-man squad.

Pete Loudon has stayed with Logan Gray and Richard Woods from last season, but has been joined by Edinburgh’s Colin Campbell at lead. Colin had played lead for Tom Brewster for a number of seasons. Pete mixes youth and experience again, although he will argue that he is still youthful! It is a strong looking team; Logan Gray skipped his own teams to three Scottish Junior titles and was unlucky to win only two Bronze Medals at World Junior level. He has just run a hugely successful Summer Skins competition in Stirling’s new rink in the Peak sports village at Forthbank. Richard Woods is a World Junior Silver Medallist from 1998 (interestingly, playing with David Murdoch) and Colin Campbell was runner-up in last season’s Scottish Championship. Pete himself was a member of Hammy McMillan’s World Championship winning team of 1999 and has also won the European Championship three times.

Tom Brewster, who came so close to winning last season’s Scottish Championship, replaces Colin Campbell at lead with David Edwards. David has skipped his own team these last few seasons and had a fair bit of success – indeed, he is a former winner of the Edinburgh International. He managed a pretty impressive double that season, winning the Perth Masters as well! Duncan Fernie proved himself a fantastic third player last season and ran Ewan MacDonald close in the 'who was the best third in Scotland?' competition. He remains Tom’s third player. Tom’s brother, Ron Brewster, is the team’s second player. Ron has always been a keen curler, but I suspect that his real love can be found away from the curling rink and in the paddock; Ron works with heavy horses and regularly enters them in competitions throughout the UK. See Ron’s home page here.

Jamie Dick, runner-up in last season’s Scottish Junior Championship, has joined John Hamilton’s team and takes over the skipping duties from John. Andrew Craigie and Graeme Copland are the team’s front end. John, Andrew and Graeme are three of GB’s Silver Medallist World University Squad from 2007 and John and Andrew played in the same competition again in 2009, finishing sixth. They should get the local support as three of them play their curling in Murrayfield; even Andrew Craigie has answered the call of the Central Belt – he has relocated from Inverness and now lives in Glasgow’s leafy west end!

Former winner, Alan Smith, is another skip who has turned his back on the last stone! He joins Iain Watt, reigning Scottish Junior Champion Steve Mitchell, and Andrew Dolman in a strong looking outfit.

Graham Shaw returns with his team of Sandy Christie, Robin Niven and Mike Niven. Graham has been a great supporter of the event over the years and had a good run last season.

Hammy McMillan, a semifinalist last season, returns with his team of Philip Wilson, Ross Paterson and local Sandy Gilmour. Hammy needs no introduction and will challenge in whatever competition he enters. Ross and Sandy are former Bronze Medallists in the World Junior Championships and Philip Wilson represented GB in the Nagano Olympics. The McMillan family has been at the forefront of curling development in the south west of Scotland since Hammy senior opened the ice rink at the North West Castle Hotel in 1969. As well as Hammy junior, the rink has produced a host of World Junior and Scottish Champions and is a major centre of the game in Scotland. The hotel’s website is here.

Former Scottish Junior champion Glen Muirhead brings Greg Drummond and new recruits Thomas Sloan, the reigning Scottish Junior Champion and Michael Goodfellow to the competition. It will be interesting to see how this strong junior team shape up against their more seasoned rivals on the ice.

Team Murdoch, the reigning World and European Champions, will be warm favourites for this season’s Edinburgh International. The competition will be an important last plank in their competitive build-up to the European Championships.

From overseas, Andy Kapp returns to defend his trophy and entries have also been received from the Czech Republic, Latvia, Ireland, England, Russia and Sweden. More about the visitors in a future post.

Entry forms can be found at www.murrayfieldcurling.co.uk.

Curling in Edinburgh

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Robin Copland describes curling in Scotland's capital city, and how the Edinburgh International came to be:

A parcel of land adjacent to the railway station of Haymarket in Edinburgh’s west end became available in 1912 when James Swan and Company Ltd, the famous animal auctioneers, relocated to a greenfield site in Chesser on the western edge of the city. The baleful bleeting of sheep and cattle on the way to their final date with destiny was replaced by the roar of curlers in their splendid new Haymarket Curling Rink.

The rink was strategically placed on the main road out of Edinburgh going towards Glasgow and beside the busy, bustling mainline railway station at Haymarket. In addition, it was well-served by local and national bus services, indeed it was the rink’s proud boast that it was easily the most accessible ice rink in Scotland.

The rink quickly established itself as the home for many famous east of Scotland curling clubs. In those far-off days, the rink provided the ice but the curlers provided their own curling stones. Lockers for the stones were available and, as well as preparing the ice for curling, the ice rink staff used to keep a record of who was curling and ensure that their stones were ready for them on the ice, suitably cooled and ready for play.

The First 'Worlds Curling Championship'

At that time, each of the large ice rinks in Scotland had a number of 'open' competitions where all the top curlers of their day would gather and play. Curling in those days was essentially an insular sport played by two great nations, Scotland and Canada. Links between the two had developed to the extent that regular organised tours took place between the two countries. The Strathcona Cup was keenly contested by curlers of the two nations and regular tours were already taking place every five years or so.

Those tours apart though, Scottish curlers lived in something of a vacuum and the sport had not yet made the inroads into Europe that would happen later. Each of the main ice rinks held one 'major' open championship each year and they each attempted to outdo the others in naming their trophies. Thus Falkirk Ice Rink hosted the 'British' – a competition that is played for to this day in Stirling Ice Rink; Crossmyloof, the first of the large indoor city rinks built in Scotland had the 'Queens' Trophy; Perth had the 'Scottish'.

Against this backdrop, Edinburgh Ice Rink Ltd, the holding company that owned and operated Haymarket Ice Rink, decided to put up a trophy for annual competition. This trophy was the somewhat grandly named 'Worlds Curling Championship'. A magnificent solid silver trophy was presented by the Edinburgh Ice Rink Ltd and it is this trophy that is now presented to the winners of the Edinburgh International Curling Championship each year.

From 1922 until 1975 the competition was hotly contested each year. The first winning rink was skipped by one of Scotland’s all time greats, W K Jackson. Indeed, his name appears on the trophy more than once. In his first winning rink there is an equally illustrious name, T B Murray. Later, Murray donated the magnificent Murray Trophy for curlers under the age of 25. Since 1975, this trophy has been presented to Scotland’s Junior Mens Champions (Under 21).

Other winners included top curlers like Willie Young of Airth, Bill Muirhead from Perth, Bob Grierson from Stranraer and Alec Torrance from Hamilton.

A scene from the second last end of the 1954 'Worlds' final at Haymarket, between teams skipped by James Sanderson and James Sellar. From the December 1954 Scottish Curler magazine.

A A Wighton, Chairman of the Edinburgh Ice Rink, presents the trophy to (L-R) James Sanderson, John Cooper, Alec Allison and Robert Moffat. From the December 1954 Scottish Curler magazine.

The Edinburgh International Curling Championship

An accommodation had to be reached with the International Curling Federation which was anxious to have exclusive use of the name 'World Curling Championship' for their own event. Up until 1967, the fledgling World Curling Championship had been growing each year. In 1968, new sponsors for the World Championship, Air Canada, presented a new trophy, the Air Canada Silver Broom, replacing the Scotch Cup.

By 1975 matters came to a head and, 53 years after W K Jackson won the first 'World Curling Championship', Edinburgh Ice Rink Ltd agreed to relinquish the name and replace it with the 'Edinburgh International'. The competition, instead of being run as a midweek knock-out tournament, became a weekend invitation tournament on the domestic circuit along with other new generation competitions like the Perth Masters, the Famous Grouse at Inverness and the Benson and Hedges at Lockerbie.

The competition thrived in the latter years of the by now old Haymarket Rink and regularly attracted foreign teams like the future World Champion Swiss rink skipped by Jurg Tanner.

Few will forget the Jurg’s sportsmanship during the 1976 final against the local rink skipped by Jimmy Sanderson. One of Jimmy’s stones picked up on what later transpired to be a Swiss coin. Immediately on learning what had happened, Jurg marched the stone back down the ice and insisted that Jimmy replay it. The big crowd that lined the barriers cheered the act as if he had won the game! Playing third on Jimmy’s losing side that day was none other than Iain Baxter, now Murrayfield Ice Rink’s manager.

The Search for the Competition’s New Home

Haymarket eventually shut down for good in 1978 and there followed a period of uncertainty as Edinburgh was without a curling venue for the first time since the Second World War. A temporary home for the competition was found in Ayr until Murrayfield Curling Rink opened its doors in 1980 and for the next seven years, the competition moved on from strength to strength as television took a serious and live interest in the sport.

Each year, STV broadcast the event showing a highlights package each night and the last five ends of the final live on the Sunday afternoon. Indeed, the Scotsport programme was hosted in Murrayfield and Arthur Montford, the legendary Scottish football commentator, regularly trod the boards in the new rink.

In the meantime invitations went out every year to the semifinalists at that year’s World Championships, so many famous curlers played for the famous old trophy. Eigil Ramsjfell, Peter Attinger, Jurg Tanner and others made the pilgrimage to the curling’s spiritual home, there to cross swords with the top Scottish curlers of the day like Chuck Hay, Colin Hamilton, Graeme Adam, Ken Horton, Willie Jamieson, Hammy McMillan and David Smith. At this stage, in the 1980s, the Edinburgh International was one of the top weekend competitions in Europe and certainly the most prestigious of the Scottish weekend competitions.

Retrenchment and Rebirth

As often happens in life, things tend to come and go in cycles. When television lost interest in the sport in the late 1980s, large-scale sponsorship dried up and the Edinburgh International, in common with other domestic competitions, had to cut its cloth. Gone were the regular visits by glamorous foreign teams; gone were the big prize pots; gone were the spectators even; and the event became just one of many on the domestic curling circuit – indeed for a couple of years, it became a mixed event!

The organising committee has been determined to raise the profile of the Edinburgh International as befits its long and illustrious history. To that end, they approached Armin Harder of the World Curling Tour – Europe in late 2007 to find out the circumstances in which the competition could be included on the growing WCT-E circuit. As it happened, the WCT-E had a window in its diary for late November and the Edinburgh International took its place again at the top table of European curling.

The competition is now a member of the newly-branded 'Champions Tour' of competitions. The 2009 event will take place at Murrayfield Ice Rink, November 27-29, 2009.

Gala Dinner and Fun Evening

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The two speakers at the Gala Dinner on Saturday, September 12, have been announced as John O’Neil and Sheriff David Smith.

John is a well-known after dinner speaker on the Scottish circuit. He has a wonderfully dry delivery and tells a tremendous story. He is a keen curler and a member of the Duddingston Curling Club, regular curlers at the Murrayfield rink. He recently spoke at the Oxenfoord Curling Club Annual Dinner and brought the house down!

Sheriff David Smith needs no introduction. He is Scotland’s leading authority on curling’s history and author of Curling: an Illustrated History. He is a Trustee of the Royal Club Charitable Trust that has been set up and charged with creating Scotland’s first curling museum. His Curling History Blog is regularly updated with research into the history of 'Scotland’s ain Game'.

Tickets for the dinner are selling well. They are priced at £25 per person. The dinner will take place on Saturday, September 12, in the Edinburgh Curling Club rooms at the Murrayfield curling rink.

Tickets can be obtained by contacting Robin Copland (Email: robin at scotwork.com), or download details as a pdf file from here.

The photo of David Smith in serious mood was taken at the recent opening of the restored Thomson Tower at Duddingston, see here.

Entry details online

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Twenty-four teams will contest the Edinburgh International Curling Championship, November 27-29, 2009. These will be split into four sections of six teams. The top two from each section will qualify for quarterfinal places. Positions will be determined on points won. No team can go out of the competition without at least playing a four-end tiebreak game. The top qualifier from each section will have the choice of last stone in the quarterfinals.

Prizes. The overall winning team will receive £4000; the runner up team will receive £2000; losing semifinalist teams will each receive £1000 and the losing quarterfinalist teams will receive £500.

More details of the competition and details of how to enter may be downloaded by clicking here.

Fundraising evening

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A Gala Dinner and Fun Evening has been organised for the evening of Saturday, September 12, in the club rooms of the Edinburgh Curling Club at Murrayfield, to support the Edinburgh International Championship. Details on how to obtain tickets (£25 per person) are on a pdf file which can be downloaded from here.

Curling begins at the Murrayfield rink on Thursday, September 17.

Last year's winners

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The winners of the 2008 event were (L-R) Andy Kapp (skip), Holger Hohne (2nd), Andy Lang (3rd) and Andreas Kempf (lead). Pic by Bob Cowan.

More photos from the 2008 event can be found here, here, here and here.

The Edinburgh International Curling Championship Blog

2009-07-12T13:25:00.004+01:00

The purpose of this blog is to provide information and news about the Edinburgh International Curling Championship. This year's event will be held at the Murrayfield Ice Rink, November 27-29, 2009.

Edinburgh International Curling Championship

The Winners

Edinburgh International Senior Championship 2011

Sunday at Murrayfield

Photos of the Day

Round Robin Report

Saturday at Murrayfield

Edinburgh International 2011

Presentation Time

The Finals

International Semifinals

Seniors Semifinals

Copey the commentator and other stories

Quarterfinals

Snaw

Section D tiebreakers

Sections C and D

Section A and B done and dusted

One section game to go

Elvis is in the building

Early Saturday

Last Post for Friday

Through the lens on Friday afternoon

First shots from Murrayfield

Webcast ready

Seniors Underway

Webcast schedule

Senior Championship Draw

International draw throws up some interesting matches

The Committee

Fund-raising dinner report

Old video footage

Fund-raising dinner

Blog online for 2010

The Presentations

The Seniors

The Final

Semifinals in summary

Faces of McCleary

Quarterfinals

Who qualified?

Saturday.... where are we?

What's hanging at Murrayfield?

Latvian adventurers

Saturday's captions

Saturday morning

Friday's Award

Friday's last post

Bob's Team of the Day

Friday's smile

Friday's second post

First on the ice on Friday

International underway

Thursday update from Murrayfield

Edinburgh at its best

Nutrition for healthy athletes

Snapshots from the Seniors

Seniors championship gets underway

McMillan withdraws

Edinburgh is the next Champions Tour event

Edinburgh International Commentary Team

Webcast plans for the Edinburgh International Curling Championships

International Draw Online

Seniors Draw now online

Teams announced for Edinburgh International

The Committee Members

Sponsored by Belhaven Best

Murrayfield rink opens for new season

Gala Dinner and Fun Evening

The Edinburgh International Senior Championship

Who's coming to Edinburgh?

Curling in Edinburgh

Gala Dinner and Fun Evening

Entry details online

Fundraising evening

Last year's winners

The Edinburgh International Curling Championship Blog