acblunit212

I have taken it upon myself to integrate two of the world's best past-times into one, ... namely duplicate bridge and curling.

OK, pick yourself off the floor and stop laughing while I explain this new cultural craze. Before discovering duplicate bridge I was a curling addict. I started
curling when I was 10 years old, and have been curling ever since. I have curled at the National level on 13 occassions, winning a National title 4 times. I have
curled in the USA as well as every province and territory in Canada. I used to think I could never find a game as addictive, competative, or enjoyable as
curling until I discovered duplicate bridge. I still rank curling as number one, but bridge is a close second.

It seemed that every year around the time of the Scotties and the Brier, people in the bridge club would find a reason to talk about curling during the breaks.
Last year, I decided to try to take advantage of this subtle interest in the world's greatest past-time (curling, not bridge, .... sorry if I offend anyone!). I thought
about a way to incorporate a game of curling with a Swiss Team game of bridge. Both events have teams of four players, and proceed at intervals of about 15
to 20 minutes, so that part was easy.

The plan was to have a team play a two end game of curling against another team, and using the winning team's curling score to give them a positive handicap
in a 7 board round of Swiss Team bridge against the same team. The combined score of the points scored in the curling game along with the score (on the 20
VP's scale) of the round of bridge would give each team an agregate score for that round. The top two teams would then play each other in round two, and
the resulting top two teams would play each other in round three (unless they were the same teams, then a simple adjustment). At the end of six ends of curling
and 21 boards of bridge, a winner was declared with the most total points in the two events.

The main logistical concern was balancing the teams with their curling abilities and their bridge abilities taken into consideration. The bridge part was easy, as I
used the data base of ACBL score to rank the players bridge abilities. The curling part was a little tougher, .... as far as I knew, none of the participants except
my wife and myself curled. A few people had come forward and said things like, " ... well I curled a few years in high school...", but that was hardly an
indication of how many Kevin Martins I had on my hands. I took the approach of profiling the participants based on age and physical appearance, .... in
hindsight, a definate error.

Some of the younger, athletic looking players were just that, .... young and athletic, but not a curling bone in their body. The surprise was finding the older
players having a lot more enthusiasm and ability than I gave them credit. I encouraged some of the older players to use the "stick" (a broom handle with a
device on the end to push a rock, similar to deck shuffleboard). These players were amazingly skilled at the game despite some of them using the stick
upside-down! My main concern was someone falling on the ice and breaking something, and thankfully that never happened.

I had collected some prizes from local businesses and purchased some prizes with leftover entry money to make sure every player got something for their
efforts. People were asked to bring a munchie for a snack table, and the night was a huge success! In the following week at the bridge club, everyone was
raving about what a great time they had, and were ready to do it again next year!

Next year is here, and on March 26th we will be having our second annual Unit 212 Curling/Bridge Superbowl. With 32 participants (some in their 80's), it
should be a blast. So, if you have a passion for something else as well as bridge, do some brain-storming to find a way to incorporate the two, and you might
be surprised at the out-come.

Now, .... how can I mix bridge and golf together, ..... until next time.....