Our ‘ young’ men end the season on a high

Arran Cameron reports:

Arran, James, David and John

Arran, James, Craig and John

“The Irish Men’s team reward for a good season was to return to the Silesian GP in Poland, the scene of much socialising in 2014.   Unfortunately with flights and hotels booked the event was cancelled due to problems with the ice pad.   Unable to obtain a berth at another European bonspiel at such a late stage we managed to secure a reserve entry to the Edinburgh International Gathering.   Held on the same weekend as the Irish Mixed playdowns we had to attend Murrayfield without our super-skip JJ Kenny who was busy doing his usual at Dumfries.   John Furey however did a superb skip’s job and together with team mates James Russell, Craig Whyte and Arran Cameron, we enjoyed three wins and a peel and less so two losses!  We were fortunate enough to play against Swiss, Scottish, Swedish and Canadian teams and placed mid table in the mid group of 28 teams.  An excellent no pressure, much socialising and enjoyable weekend was had to close the season.  Will now be taking break for a few months before Coach Sutherland calls us once again to arms at the Stirling Skins in July.  Happy Summer everyone!”

Scores on the doors….

Some of the scores from the players themselves at the mixed have proved to be a bit dodgy. So, let’s go with what the umpire wrote down:

Results  

  • Game 1 Sat 10am Gray beat Kenny  9-6
  • Game 2 Sat  1.45pm Fyfe beat Kenny 9-1
  • Game 3 Sat  4.45pm Fyfe beat Gray 5-2
  • Game 4 Sun 9.30am Kenny beat Gray 6-4 SemiFinal
  • Game 5 Sun 1pm Kenny beat Fyfe 6-4 Final
Championees! But where did that trophy come from?

Championees!
But where did that trophy come from?

Our new champion lead Jen said of her triumph:

” I’m chuffed with the win, especially seeing as it’s my first season playing. Really grateful to Marie Tony and JJ for asking me to play in their team and keeping me right. Looking forward to Bern in September!

“Overall it was a really good weekend and the fact there was nothing between the three teams made for some exciting matches.”

Mixed review – Team Gray

20150328_164445Bill said: “Team Gray really enjoyed their weekend which gave a couple of our newer members a chance to play in a high level competition.
We had a good Saturday, coming from behind to beat Johnjo’s team in our first game, changing our game plan a bit in the second half which allowed us to score a big end in the seventh to pretty much seal the win. We then had a very close game against David Whyte’s outfit in our second game. We always struggled to impose ourselves on that game as they played really well but we were in with a shout until the seventh when David played a great hit to score two.
“On Sunday in the semi final, we found Team Kenny to be much tougher opposition than they had been in the first game on the Saturday. Coming from behind 6-3 down after six, we couldn’t quite repeat the heroics of Saturday but managed to get ourselves into a position to possibly force a steal in the eighth end but my last stone guard over-curled slightly to give the big man the narrowest of opportunities to get through the guards and take the shot to win – which he nailed of course!!
“The final itself was worthy of the name – a really close fought game which came down to the last stone as had the semi. I don’t suppose we could have asked for more!
“Commiserations to David and his gang – great to see ‘the young ones’ Ailsa and  Alison in action together. The future is bright!! Congratulations to JJ and his team  for a great win. Jen was as white as a sheet as she waited for David to play his last stone attempted runback in the last end!! She recovered pretty quickly once she realised they had won!
“As for my team, it was a pleasure curling with them and I thank them for asking me to skip them. I want to particularly mention Jacqui who, like Jen was playing in her first outing in the ICA and did herself proud as did Ross and Margarita. As Ross commented; ‘the margins are pretty tight at this level’ which was a measure of the standard of curling on show.
“All in all a great weekend and hopefully going into next season we will have more entries for these competitions.”

Final weekend at Stranraer

20150329_150417It’s been a busy weekend for ICA curlers.

Peter Wilson and Charlotte Tierney, along with teammates Lauren Morgan and Richard Stevenson, made the semi-finals of the final weekend at Stranraer Ice Rink.

Having lost the semi the wheels came right off in the 3rd / 4th play-off – but they won friends with their sporting demeanour!

Jen Ward – Irish Mixed Curling Champion!

After defeating Bill Gray, Margarita Sweeney-Baird, Ross Barr and Jacqui Barr 7-5 this morning, Johnjo Kenny and his

The champions for 2015

The champions for 2015

team of Marie O’Kane, Tony Tierney and Jen Ward won the Irish Mixed Championships at Dumfries Ice Bowl this afternoon beating David Whyte, Alison Fyfe, Neil Fyfe and Ailsa Anderson in the final.

A terrific achievement for new curler Jen Ward. Well done Jen – Irish champion!

More news, reactions – and scores – tomorrow.

Mixed results -day 1

20150328_134924In the round-robin at the mixed in Dumfries the team of David Whyte, Alison Fyfe, Neil Fyfe and Ailsa Anderson go straight to tomorrow’s final after winning both their games.

Johnjo Kenny with his team of Marie O’Kane, Tony Tierney and Jen Ward lost both of their games but are still not out of things as they will play the team ranked two – Bill Gray, Margarita Sweeney-Baird, Ross Barr and Jacqui Barr -with one win and one defeat, in tomorrow’s semi-final.

Scores:

Game 1 – Team Gray 9 Team Kenny 6

Game 2 – Team Whyte 9 Team Kenny 1

Game 3 – Team Whyte 5 Team Gray 2

New face at the Mixed Championships

The Irish Mixed Championships will take place this weekend at Dumfries Ice Bowl. Three team are entered with the winners heading to Berne in Switzerland for the first ever world mixed championships 12-19th September:

Team A: Bill Gray, Margarita Sweeney-Baird, Ross Barr, Jacqui Barr

Team B: Johnjo Kenny, Marie O’Kane, Tony Tierney, Jen Ward

Team C: Neil Fyfe, Alison Fyfe, David Whyte, Ailsa Anderson

Draw – Saturday

Game 1 – AvB

Game 2 – BvC

Game 3 – AvC

 Sunday:

Game 4 – semi -final: lowest ranked two playoff to go to final

Game 5 – final: winner of semi v highest ranked after 3 games.

We were delighted that Jacqui Barr joined the ICA ranks recently. Jacqui will be playing with dad Ross at the weekend.

 Jacqui is  28 years old and qualifes for international duty as dad was born in Ireland. She has been curling for about two and a half years after starting curling with the Saturday Sweep club at Braehead before moving on to join the Braehead Virtual Curling Club. Recently Jacqui become a member of Bearsden Curling Club. She is a chartered accountant and works as a senior financial analyst for Supply Technologies in Glasgow.   

Campbell and Jacqui

Campbell and Jacqui

Jacqui recently got engaged to her boyfriend Campbell Davidson who proposed during a skiing holiday in Avoriaz, France. Aaawwww……

 

 

Closing bonspiel winners

David, Frances, Andrew, Arran and Marie

David, Frances, Andrew, Arran and Marie

The team of David Whyte, Arran Cameron, Andrew Gilmore and Frances Donald won the closing ICA bonspiel at Hamilton Ice Rink earlier this month. Congratulations to them. Bonspiel organiser Marie O’Kane presented them with the trophy and prizes before the annual general meeting.

Results:
PJ Wilson,Christine Furey, John Burns, Frances Whyte 2
David Whyte, Arran Cameron, Andrew Gilmore and Frances Donald 10
 
Bill Gray, John Graham,Sharon Graham and Clare McCormick 9
Ian Donald, Louise Kerr, Margarita Sweeney-Baird  and Jen Ward 3
 
Carolyn Hibberd, Ross Barr, Claire Darragh/Marie O’Kane and Gillian Russell 5 
Johnjo Kenny, Yvonne Chalmers, Jacqui Barr and Nathan Furey 4
 
At the AGM, tribute was paid to retiring president PJ Wilson who had done sterling work for the ICA during his two years in the hot seat.
Mr President hands over to Miss President!

Mr President hands over to Miss President!

Here is PJ handing over the president’s medal to his stunned successor, who thought she had another year up her sleeve before becoming a responsible person!

Irish Pete reflects on the playdowns

Irish Pete It was a great men’s championships in Dumfries recently. Unfortunately, one team had to be the losers and their skip Peter Wilson reflects here on the weekend:

Peter said:
Like Johnjo says our team of Tony Tierney, Alan Mitchell, Alan Gilmore and myself were a last minute get together and, with no practice together beforehand, I think the score in the first half of game one was a direct result of that. But after half time we got ourselves going and took that game to the last stone.
“In games two and three we played much better as a result of getting to understand each others’ play. We did much better and won both two and three, although both were tight games.
“Game four was a last stone decider and we had my final draw for the game, which was good for weight, but was always high of line and as a result we lost a two and the match.
“The decider had plenty of spice as both teams were up for this one. Once again the last stone  was needed to produce a winner. In the tenth end we had a draw  for a two to win the match and the championship but as I played the stone I got a pick up from my hand and it came up short, catching on a front guard. In the extra end we had a good end set up as we were lying three when Johnjo went to play the final stone. He drew a lovely shot between our counters to win by an inch.
“I thoroughly enjoyed the competition as did my team and we all enjoyed playing with each other over the weekend.
“I want to take this opportunity to wish the winners, and their coach Martin, all the very best at the ‘C’ Division in Champrey,  and I’m sure they will do Ireland proud.”

Irish Pete has always been the man for the big shot. Here, thanks to Gail Munro, is the clip of his last end, last shot double raise to beat PJ in the Irish weekend at Stranraer last month. PJ was two up and possibly lying two when the thunderbolt struck!

Johnjo looks back at the men’s championship

EMCC2013-JJJJ has had a busy time recently onthe ice rinks of Scotland, but he has finally had time to give us his thoughts on all the excitement in Dumfries recently:

 “So a throwaway remark to (Team Coach) Martin Sutherland that I would be happy to train with and even play a few games, if required, with the Men’s team resulted in another visit to Dumfries Ice Bowl for the Men’s Irish Championship in early March. Only the second time ( I think) that we have had a men’s championship in our short history. Pre-tournament time was short and as always in the ICA our geographical spread meant that we did not have time to play together as a team before the championship, but our rivals hadn’t either. It was no real shock then that the games that unfolded thereafter were occasionally a bit ragged as both teams looked for consistency but in general terms the standard of play was good. We chopped and change our line-up and personnel over the weekend as had always been our plan. The old guard of James Russell, Arran Cameron and John Furey were joined by new recruit Eoin McCrossan and all of them played their part in winning the title. The games are all a bit hazy in my memory now. We won the first game managing just to defend our big half time lead to the end. We then lost games two and three after losing decisive ends in the second half of the games. A strategy rethink was required and we played much more cagey games on Sunday and narrowly squeaked home in both with our share of luck. I think our winning margin in the extra end of game five was about an inch, or so I am told. I threw the shot then left it to the guys and they did the rest. The big winner of Irish Championships is Irish Curling. Let’s hope next season will bring more challengers and a bigger tournament. So now we look forward to much practice before we head to Switzerland in October, we are all looking forward to it. And finally commiserations to Peter, Tony, Alan and especially new recruit Andrew Gilmore. Their is no consolation in losing by the smallest fractions but I am certain their resolve will be strengthened for the future.”