USWCA NEWS By Shelley Dropkin, USWCA President
of events are being held across the country. This is a time of long weekends, tired Mondays, and the joy of being in the “thick of it.” The USWCA’s bonspiels and events are indeed an integral part of this
schedule. It is as an organization that provides a wide range of curling op- portunities to women and youth throughout our clubs, regions and across the country. As mentioned in the November USWCA article, these bonspiels and events include: • National Women’s Bonspiel – a 32-team national event rotated through each region;
•
Senior Women’s Bonspiel – a national senior bonspiel rotated through each region;
• 5 Year and Under – regional competitions for women curlers with less than five years of curling experience;
• All-American - intra-club events for USWCA members; •
Junior Bonspiels – sponsorship of regional bonspiels with funded awards; and,
• Women’s Circuit – regional tour with cumulative monetary awards supporting competitive development.
For this article, I would like to take the opportunity to share with you in-
formation about another unique aspect of the USWCA – the two very special international tours, which we sponsor on rotating schedules with Scotland and Canada, also known as the Scot Tour and Senior Friendship Tour, re- spectively. The purpose of the tours is to promote the fun of curling and in- ternational good will, as well as friendship, camaraderie and friendly com- petition. The Scot Tour is an inter-continental curling event which began in 1955
when a joint team of eight Americans and eight Canadians visited and curled throughout Scotland for a month. The opportunity to reciprocate some of the famous Scottish hospitality came in 1958 when 16 Scottish ladies arrived to spend a week in Montreal, a week in Ontario and two weeks in the USA from Illinois to Massachusetts. The first tour held exclusively in the United States was in 1963 when 24
Scots were hosted by the USWCA and toured throughout Wisconsin, Min- nesota, New York, and Massachusetts. It was during the next tour in 1966 that the first exclusively American team toured Scotland. At the time, 20 USWCA members curled at all eight curling centers existing in Scotland at the time. As a result of the success of these tours between the U.S. and Scotland, a clear schedule for these three-week exchange tours was established and agreed- upon. They have occurred on an alternating five-year schedule, as members from the USWCA have visited Scotland since 1966 and the Scots have visited the U.S. since 1977. Some of the women who have had this “unforgettable opportunity,” de-
scribe their experience as follows: •
1958 Tour – Jean Gow, captain of the Scottish team – “The primary purpose of these exchange tours is the fun of curling and the interna- tional good will engendered by the friendly matches. To true curlers, winning new friends is reward enough.”
•
1996 Tour – Anne Robertson – “Three weeks and 25 games was really a marathon – different people, different ice. It was a huge privilege to be on the tour, which had a huge impact on my life!”
So many benefits to USWCA membership W
•
ith the Olympics in our midst and all of the bonspiels oc- curring in clubs and arenas, our curling season is truly in its “mid-season.” Playdowns and nationals, as well as a plethora
2006 Tour – Deborah Moulton, captain of the U.S. team – “All of us who went on this tour will remember this experience as not only the highlight of our curling careers, but as one of the high- lights of our lives.”
The second tour, which the
USWCA sponsors is the Senior Friendship Tour, an interna- tional curling exchange be- tween Canada and the U.S. for women ages 50 years and over. It began in 1990 following dis- cussion with the International Exchange Tour Chairman of the Canadian Curling Association (CCA), and several Canadian and U.S. curlers. The first Tour took place in the United States, which hosted 16 Canadi- an women and four U.S. couriers who toured by bus to clubs in Minnesota and North Dakota. As a result of such a successful tour, it was decided to continue this special curling exchange with Canada on a three-year rotational basis. USWCA curlers were invited to take part in the first Canadian-sponsored
Dropkin
tour in November 1994 when 16 USWCA women toured the Canadian Mari- time provinces. The tour today occurs every three years, alternately with the United States and the provinces of Canada. In hearing from women who have participated in the Senior Friendship
Tour, some of their comments include the following: •
2006 Tour – Carolyn MacLeod – “A transforming experience – friend- ship is the key word. As a tour participant, I met 15 USWCA curlers from all across the country – strangers when the Tour started. But over the course of the two-week Tour, we became BFFs for life. We call ourselves Curlfriends.”
•
2012 Tour – Molly Jensen – “To be part of this tour made each of us feel we not only represented our own interests in curling but also as representatives of the USWCA, we really did extend the hands of friendship across the miles to all Canadian women.”
•
2012 Tour – Laurie Rahn – “Experience of a lifetime! We had a spec- tacular time and were all so grateful for this opportunity.”
In describing the overall impact of the tour experience, Donna Purkey, who
was captain of the U.S. team on the 1996 Scot Tour, summarized by sharing the following, “You never really leave a place you love. Part of it you take with you, leaving a part of yourself behind.” Participation in both tours is open to any woman who is a USWCA mem-
ber. Teams are chosen by a lottery for the Senior Friendship Tour and by com- mittee for the Scot Tour. Involvement in the USWCA is appreciated, but not required. I would like to personally encourage any woman interested in being considered for participation in one of these tours to complete the registration process. The next Scot tour will be held in November 2016, and the next Senior Friendship Tour will be held in Canada in the fall of 2015. Information about the upcoming tours will be found in the USWCA section of the Curling News, and at our website
www.USWCA.org. n
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