North Bay Nugget e-edition

Curling’s best coming to city

GREG ESTABROOKS

The world’s best 32 men’s and women’s teams will be assembling in North Bay for the Boost National Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling.

Co- chairs Rick Miller and Mark Brown addressed the media on Friday morning at a news conference at Memorial Gardens.

Play will start at that facility on Oct. 4 and run until Oct. 9.

Brown was justifiably excited about the teams coming here.

“Headlining the field on the women’s side of the draw will be skips Jennifer Jones, Rachel Homan, Kerri Einarson and Anna Hasselborg while the men’s field will include skips Brad Gushue, Kevin Koe, Nicholas Edin and Bruce Mouat.”

North Bay smashed attendance records twice when the city hosted the 2018 World Women’s Curling Championships and the Pinty’s Grand Slam event in October of 2019.

Miller has been amazed by the previous attendance levels at the elite curling events and by volunteer participation.

“We only have 30 new volunteers for this event. It shows how much fun the other ( 130) volunteers had helping out the last time.”

An event of this scope would not fly without corporate support, which Miller adds is not a problem for the coming Grand Slam event.

“Sponsorships are amazing. The community has come through.”

Five years ago, Miller, Brown and Dave Bennett rolled the dice on bringing a world championship curling competition to North Bay. There were concerns back then, those concerns evaporated quickly.

Miller says the ticket sales this time around are good, but the numbers are not as lofty as 2018 or 2019.

“It is hard in this environment; people are still nervous due to the pandemic. We have been incredibly pleased with the ticket sales — they have gone well. Rogers Sportsnet ( the host broadcaster) is ecstatic about ( ticket numbers) because they have had events for the last couple of years with no fans. The players are excited. Players love to play in front of fans,” said Miller.

The game of curling has been going through some changes in the last few years as many elite teams have shuffled their rosters from year to year.

Brown jokes that it may be a bonus.

“There is a free agent frenzy in curling. Maybe that will help our program sales because every team seems to have a new player on it, at least one new player. It will be remarkably interesting to see how those people are working together on the ice. I think it will bring people out to see what the new lineups look like.”

Full- event packages, weekend ticket packages and single draw tickets are now available.

For ticket information visit https:// tinyurl. com/ y9eh5kfz

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2022-09-24T07:00:00.0000000Z

2022-09-24T07:00:00.0000000Z

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