Ukrainian Frontiers - Curling in St. Catharines

Today (March 4) saw the debut performance of "Ukrainian Frontiers" UCU's very own curling team at the St. Catharines - Thorold Chamber of Commerce Bonspiel. The idea for the team was dreamt up by Yuriy Nesvit, our branch manager in St. Catharines, who is an active participant in the events held by the Chamber. Yuriy held a recruitment drive, spending considerable evenings poring over scouting reports, deciding who to draft onto the team, and holding training sessions and skills camps, before he settled on his perfect team.


"Ukrainian Frontiers" curling team.
Pictured L to R: John (our skip), Yuriy N., Yuriy D., and Earl


I was honored to be chosen as part of the team even though I had never curled before in my life. Yuriy must have seen some hidden talent and chosen me on that basis. What that hidden talent was, became obvious once the tourney started. turns out the winners have to buy the losers a round (I guess Yuriy was counting on my total lack of skill to help out in that regard!).


Yuriy Nesvit channels Wayne Middaugh




In any case, I was pleasantly surprised by two things. 1. Curling is a whole heap of fun. 2. It is much more of a workout than I had imagined. All that sweeping really warms you up.

 

We played Bob's team (he's holding the
motor oil) first. Carol Ann (on the left)
owns a great little B&B in Port Dalhousie.
Also pictured are Nancy and Bert.



So how did we do? Well the first two teams we played were kind enough to let us come out ahead.
 

Yuriy Nesvit with the International
Brotherhood of Electrical Workers team
members. They had the best uniforms,
but it was not enough to stop us.










Then it was off to lunch and some serious networking. Much to our surprise, when we went to check the standings after lunch, not only were we unbeaten, but we were in second place points-wise. And thus, we found ourselves in the Championship playoff against the Honeywell 1 team.

We played through 4 tension filled ends. After the second end, we actually had to pull out one of those compass-like devices to measure which rock was closest to the button. We had to measure twice it was so close! Down by one point leading into the fourth end, we slowly and strategically placed our rocks exactly where they needed to be. But the Honeywell team, just as doggedly, kept blasting us out of scoring position. On our last rock our skip made a perfect shot that would have allowed us to tie the game up and force an extra end. But alas, Honeywell had the hammer and used it to their best advantage. No matter, we came in second place out of 12 teams so we were pretty proud of ourselves.

The Honeywell 1 team that finally succeeded
 in taking us down in the championship game.
L to R: Dawn, Jack, Jeff, Dan

Diane Kusiak, Membership Manager of the St. Catharines
Chamber of Commerce and one of the Bonspiel organizers,
is also a member of UCU’s St. Catharines Advisory Council

Anyway, Ukrainian Frontiers owes a debt of gratitude to our skip John for seeing us through to the final. And we'll be back next year hungry for that trophy.