[Editor’s note: we will have more on the PEI leg of the Tour as it approaches. The Tour’s last visit to PEI was in 2003, while Roddie MacLean and Jim Farquharson from the Cornwall Curling Club went to Scotland for the event in January 2009]
(by Jean Mills). This January, Canadian curlers coast to coast will compete in a championship that brings Scottish teams across the Atlantic to battle – in friendly fashion – for curling supremacy. Plans are underway for the Strathcona Cup Tour 2013.
Scottish curlers pose in Winnipeg for an official photograph during their 1903 tour
(Photo Howard H. Ward / Library and Archives Canada)
It’s a tradition that started in 1902, when a resolution passed at the Annual General Meeting of the Royal Caledonia Curling Club supported sending 25 Scottish curlers to Canada for a friendly competition. The tour was such a success that the Canadians made a return visit in 1909, and the ongoing battle for the Strathcona Cup began.
For the 2013 tour, the wheels are already in motion.
“The Scots have selected the 60 curlers who will be coming to Canada,” reports Hugh McCarrel, Canadian Chairman of the 2013 Strathcona Cup Tour. “They have been split into three tours of 20 and we received their CVs earlier this week. Bill Duncan, President of the RCCC, will be touring with the Scots and will be splitting his time equally among the tours.”
The Scots arrive on January 9th and will attend opening banquets in Halifax, Ottawa, and Vancouver, representing the three tours – East, Central and West.
“For the first time, all ten provinces are included in the tour,” says McCarrel. “The East tour after leaving Halifax, will head to St. John’s, Newfoundland, for their first-ever visit.”