Scottish Championships - Playoffs

Apologies for the delay in the blog, a combination of being ridiculously hungover, having to go back to work and not wanting to rehash it all put it at the back of the list..

I am assuming the majority of people will have already heard the results of the weekend, but we will recap anyway.

The 3v4 game against Warwick Smith took place at 2.30pm on Saturday.

Edwards 10040 20010 -  8

W Smith 00201 01201 -  7

We were under a fair bit of pressure at the start of the game until the 4^th end, where we managed to take a 4. We played well for the next couple of ends until we got a little generous and dished out a steal of 2 in the 8^th end.  This made the game a lot tighter. In the final end, Warwick had a tough tap back for 2 to get to an extra. It was very close, but his stone didn’t curl quite enough. This secured our place in the semi-final against Logan Gray who lost the 1v2 against Tom Brewster.

In between having a drink with Warwicks team, shaking lots of people hands, deciding what stones we want to play and eating, we did not really have very much time between the 3v4 and the semi.

This is how the game against Logan went.

Edwards 00200 03010 - 5

Gray       03001 00102 - 6

We didn’t have an ideal second end. We started to get in a bit of trouble when John’s freeze attempt picked allowing Logan to take the initiative. Following that, we made a good attempt at a comeback and took the lead for the first time in the game when Logan flashed a double attempt to give us 3 in the 7th. 1 up without the hammer in the 10^th end, things were going well and looked as if we were headed for an extra end. We under iced Dave’s peel and that gave Logan an opportunity to come around to make his 2. Dave made a very good freeze on Logan’s stone and sat shot with about 2 inches between them. Logan played a fantastic shot that chipped our shot stone over the face of his to earn his 2 and a place in a final. We called for an ambitious measure in hope that the umpire would mess it up in some manner, but unfortunately we were not so lucky!

So we got another 3rd place but over the course of the year we were a far better team. Also, looking at the games we did lose. We made it very difficult for teams to beat us. Our opponents had to make their lost stone on every occasion.

Congratulations to Team Brewster and good luck in Victoria.

So what do you do after losing the semi final of the Scottish?

Of course you do. I would like to give you a run down of what went on, but everything is still very hazy. There was a frisbee, Andy Mac getting naked and I had significant issues negotiating the stairs in The Loft. That is all there is in the bank.

That is it for the season. The Team Edwards mixed team will be making a reappearance at this years Scottish Mixed Championships at the end of March, so you may get some more blogging at that point. But for now, we are out.

Cheers
Team Edwards
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Scottish Championships Thursday/Friday

First up on Thursday was Warwick Smith. They are always a tough team to beat and it was a grind throughout the game. Thankfully, we had the hammer coming home and had to touch a piece of the 1ft for the win. We made the shot and got the win.

Edwards 01002 10001 - 5
W Smith 00020 02000 - 4

This time it was John’s turn to cook. We went to Simon Howie’s butcher and spent a fair whack of money on 4 of their best steaks as a treat.  John attached all of the trimmings you would expect with a steak such as onion rings, chips and mushrooms. It was a bloody good meal.

John and his meat

Apparently steak is the meal you should have if you want to play some good curling. In our game against Glen Muirhead we were pretty red hot for the first half of the game and generated a 7-2 lead at the half way point. We cooled slightly for the second half of the game but managed to win after 9 ends.

Edwards    20203 0101X 9
Muirhead  01010 1020X 5

After the game we had a couple of pints in the ice rink then headed home to get back to our now standard evening activity, Call of Duty Modern Warfare. We have been playing this game more and more as John’s confidence was getting shattered with the racing games. It is getting pretty annoying how dominant he is in this game though.

Our only game on Friday was against Grant Hardie. John took the courtesy of “fraping” Billy Morton during Team Hardies practice as he left his phone vulnerable and unlocked in their brush bad. Hope the crabs clear up, Billy! The first end was an absolute howler. The Hardie team had nothing to lose and went mega aggressive and they made everything. We even had the hammer in the first, so it is worse than it seems! We managed to claw it back well throughout the game and had a tricky shot for the win. We were a bit tight and gave up a steal.

Edwards 00210 30000 - 6
Hardie    40001 00011 - 7

The way results went, the game against Grant did not matter and we ended up in the same position as we would have had we won. This is how the top of the table finished.

1. Tom Brewster 8-1
2. Logan Gray 7-2
3. David Edwards 6-3
4. Warwick Smith 6-3


Tom Brewster will play Logan Gray in the 1v2 for a place in the final. We play Warwick Smith in the 3v4 game. The loser of the 1v2 will play the winner of the 3v4 in the semi-final. Because we won our game against Warwick in the round robin, we get the hammer.

After the game we had the Scottish Championships Players’ Dinner.

We were seated with Lauren Baxter’s team and it was an enjoyable evening. Mike Ferguson gave a rundown of went on during the Strathcona Cup. It was a far less explicit version than Greig had been telling us over the last couple of days!

The presentation of trophies and prizes for the Scottish Curling Tour took place at this dinner and we earned this massive novelty cheque.

Does anybody know where you go to cash in a cheque this size?

Congratulations also go to Team Barr, who won the Ladies Scottish Curling Tour. I have a feeling, to be considered a tour, there has to be more than one event. But a trophy is a trophy!

Dave gave an acceptance speech that included some of his opinions on the current funding set up of Scottish curling that echoed Robin Copland’s from last year. The speech got a very good response and earned him 20 more followers on Twitter. So to make him not feel quite as special, here is a link to all of the Team Edwards members Twitter accounts.

@jpcurling – John Penny
@ccampbell_curl – Colin Campbell
@granitecitydave – David Edwards
@scottmacleod1 – Scott Macleod
@TeamDEdwards – Team Edwards

You can also give Team Edwards a like on Facebook if you want to keep up with how things are going on. You might have to trawl through a couple of Twilight fan pages to get to the right one though!

This morning we had a 30 minute practice with the stones we are about to play Warwick with. Only Alan Smith turned up for the Team Smith practice and soldiered on matching the stones solo. Such a casual way to go into it!

Our game kicks off against Warwick at 2.30pm today along with the 1v2 game and the playoffs in the women’s side of the draw. If we win, we will be back on at 7.30pm this evening in the semi-final.

Cheers
Team Edwards
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Scottish Championships – Tuesday/Wednesday

After our game against Hammy we headed to Tesco for some more fuel. This time it was Scott’s turn to do the cooking for the day. His meal of choice was Chicken Enchiladas. While in Tesco, Scott and Dave were convinced into some doing product testing of some Peanut Butter. This delayed our already famished team from eating. So it was much to our dismay, that when we arrived at Tudor Cottage ready to get started cooking, that Dave had left the keys to the cottage in his jacket pocket, which was still in the ice rink. David “Rhiann” Edwards.

Scott began to create his meal and created one hell of a mess. Peppers, onions, packaging and enchilada spice powder were all over the place.

The enchiladas were actually fairly good and filled a massive hole.  The good news is that, so far, no one has food poisoning.

After the Mexican feast we were up against David Murdoch/Tom Brewster. This is how the game panned out.

Edwards  02000 10001 0 -4
Brewster 10011 00010 1 -5

We hammered the draw shot challenge the entire length of the sheet and got within a couple of inches to the pin. Unfortunately, Murdoch canned it and won the hammer. As you can see, it was a very tight game that went the way of Murdoch after an extra. We played well but could not get the double-ewe this time.

After the game we had a de-brief with Greig Henderson who was giving his opinion of some of the tactical decisions we made over the course of the game. Here is Greig re-enacting the 9th end using pints of Tennents and a can of coke.

Our first game on Wednesday was against Kyle Smith. During the practice, we noticed that Team McCleary’s coach, Martin Sutherland, was wearing shorts on the ice. This was in protest to the “no jeans on the ice” ruling that was being enforced by the umpires on coaches. We think that he made his point pretty well.

We slipped back button with our draw which was not quite good enough to earn the hammer. This is how the game progressed.
Edwards 00000 404 X 8
K Smith   00011 010 X 3

We managed to get a couple of big ends towards the end of the game against the temperamental youngsters and got the win that sets us up well going into the last couple of games.

Today the game of choice on the XBOX 360 was Call of Duty Black Ops 2. We played a team death match with Colin and John versus Scott and Dave. This time John showed some prowess and managed to find a helicopter gunship that was tearing Scott and Dave a new one.  This was while Colin was just running around in circles and jumping wondering why he was getting shot. The overall win count was definitely in Colin and John’s favour but Scott and Dave redeemed themselves slightly and got the win in the last round.

It was Colin’s job to create the meal for yesterday. He ran into a stumbling block almost instantly as we discovered that there was no chicken left. Scott had used 8 chicken breasts (2 days supplies) in his meal yesterday. Once that issue was resolved, Colin got started cooking his Red Thai Curry with extra chilli.

We were up against Logan Gray in the next game. This is how the linescore went down.

Edwards 10000 10001 0 - 4
Gray        00100 01010 1 - 5

We had so many chances but let them all slip through our fingers. Not picking up that Dave’s last stone was really straight was the thing that killed us.

Today we have Warwick Smith and Glen Muirhead. We currently stand joint 3rd on the table with a record of 4-2. If we win the remainder of our games we will qualify for the 1v2 playoff. If you we start losing, it could be messy!

Cheers
Team Edwards
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Scottish Championships - Monday/Tuesday

We arrived late on Sunday evening at Tudor House and settled into the extremely swanky accommodation. John and Dave were there first and stocked us up with all the essentials from Tesco.

Yesterday we started early and got up at 6.45am for the 8am practice. We had a throw on each of the sheets but we were unfortunately following Team Brewster who, we were surprised to learn, had not had a training weekend teaching them how to tidy up their stones.

We had an hour and a half between the end of the practice and the start of our game against Neil Joss, so we topped up our breakfast with some bacon rolls and handed Greig Henderson his altered Team Edwards jacket in prep for the game.

The ice was good and quick, but we did not quite get to grips with the speed during the practice and gifted the hammer to Joss. Here is the line score as to how the game played out.

Edwards  00220 2002X 8
Joss          02002 0010X 5

After the win, we hung around the ice rink for a bit before heading back to Methven where we were planning on killing a bit of time. A big shout out has to go to Louise Edwards who cemented her position as No.1 WAG with an extremely impressive baking selection to feast on.

Louise's masterpiece

After adding a couple kilos, we sat down as a team with the XBOX 360. The game of choice for the day was Project Gotham Racing. After a couple of 1v1 battles it was clear there was a bit of a hierarchy and that some participants were clearly dominant.  The rankings were as follows.

1. David Edwards
2. Scott Macleod
3. Colin Campbell
4. John Penny

After a few more races, we were all starting to realise how bad John actually was. He was closer to 5th place than 3rd.

John getting hosed

For anybody who is unfamiliar with the game, there are several different classes of car. Class A being the best, with Class E is the worst. Dave challenged John to a race using a Class E (the worst car) while John was using a Class A (the best). It was effectively a Ferrari against a Toyota Prius. We will give John his due, it was a close race. Coming into the last corner John held a sizable lead. In an extremely embarrassing turn of events for John, we witnessed one of the biggest chokes in history. He absolutely hammered the wall on a chicane and ended up facing the wrong way while Dave nipped past in his Toyota to claim the victory. Shameful.

Yesterday Dave took on Chef Duty and he prepared a Chicken and Broccoli Pasta bake. Here is Dave with the fruits of his labour.

Chicken and Broccoli Pastbake

In our second game we lined up against Ross McCleary. We have had a couple tight games with them so far this season so we were not expecting it to be easy. Fortunately for us we had a very good first end and ran it out from there. Here is the linescore.

Edwards    503102X 11
McCleary  010020X  3

One thing to note in this game is that when John was asked to peel a stone out the house, he released the stone in a very unusual fashion. Here is his explanation of what happened from the man himself.

John Penny “I must have rolled my leg under my body or something, then I ended up rolling onto my back, and I couldn’t get back over to let it go.”

Basically, he ended up on his arse. This was much to the amusement of everybody around.

Our first game today was against Hammy McMillan. Here is the line score.

Edwards  00101 1201X 6
McMillan 10010 0010X 3

We were toiling for a couple ends at the start of the game but we managed to bail out well. The second half of the game went better and we managed to steal a couple of points when Hammy missed a draw.

Next up for us is a top of the table clash against Tom Brewster. If we manage to win this game, the table will be looking very sexy for us.

Cheers
Team Edwards
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Scottish Championships 2013

Well the Scottish Championships are getting close and we will try, but ultimately fail to post on a regular basis.

This week we will be staying at Tudor Cottage in Methven.

Tudor Cottage

“Charming Tudor Cottage with woodburning stove, open plan kitchen, living, dining room and additional gallery living space, 2 bedrooms ensuite, ideal for couples, families, shooting and fishing parties.”

It sounds and looks just a little bit too expensive/classy for us, but Dave has assured us that the price is very reasonable! Does anybody know how to work a woodburning stove? I will bring my axe.

Lumberjack needed.

The owner and proprietor is a Mr David Murdoch. We don't think it is the one we will maybe be playing against.

We will be in the Perth area from Sunday evening as our practice is at a ridiculously early 8am. I think we get 10 minutes per sheet. Not a huge amount of time to match the stones considering the time the institute teams have been in Dewars. But luckily for us, one of the institute teams left their rock book unattended and we are now fully up to date on all of them. Cheers Rambo! Yellow C number 4 is a dog, eh?

This is how the draw looks for us.

Monday 11 Feb - 8am Practice

Monday 11 Feb - 10.50am v Neil Joss
Monday 11 Feb - 9pm v Ross McCleary

Tuesday 12 Feb - 11am v Hammy McMillan
Tuesday 12 Feb - 7pm v Tom Brewster

Wednesday 13 Feb - 12 noon v Kyle Smith
Wednesday 13 Feb - 8pm v Logan Gray

Thursday 14 Feb - 12 noon v Warwick Smith
Thursday 14 Feb - 8pm v Glen Muirhead

Friday 15 Feb - 3pm v Grant Hardie

Hopefully we have a few more games after all that, but we will see.

So far this season we have been completely coach-less. For the Scottish Championships we have managed to secure a short term deal with internationally acclaimed curler and tactical genius, Greig Henderson. Team Edwards have previously had the pleasure of being coached by Greig and we are happy to welcome such an "experienced" curler to our ranks. If you would like to learn more about Mr Henderson, check out his bio at the top of the screen.

Greig in his previous coaching role.

I wish the Royal Caledonian Curling Club would let us know before entering, that if we qualify, we would have to take part in some Home Economics. This is not worth it. After several attempts to complete stitching the Co-operative Funeralcare logo on my shirts, I gave up and went for the Duct Tape method.

Duct tape method + shamless plug

The duct tape method is quick and effective. On top of this it is also very aesthetically pleasing. Unfortunately, I have a feeling that the umpires will not be of the same opinion.

So...... another Team Edwards plead.

Are you good at sewing?
Do you want sew 4 logos on 4 Team Edwards shirts?
No?

Fine. I will do it myself.

Cheers
Team Edwards
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Petrofac Aberdeen City Open

Last weekend we competed in the final Goldline Scottish Curling Tour event of the season. This was quite an important weekend for us as we had the opportunity to win the Tour if we were to finish ahead of Murray Young in the standings.

Frequenters of the Team Edwards blog will know that we were in need of a replacement due to our self-proclaimed glorious leader being AWOL. Graeme Penny, John’s wee brother stepped in to fill the void, much like Miguel did during Dave’s appointment.

Our first game was against Craigie. John’s debut skipping the team went well and we generated a comfortable lead at the start of the game. Due to the much loved Schenkel system that was in place, we kept our foot on the gas and ran out 8-2 winners with 6 ends in the bank.

Dave was smooth and back in action for our second game against Murray Young who had stuck their ringer, Grant Hardie, into skip. Obviously, as they were our only competition for the overall title it would have been nice to get a win over them. We got a small lead, but with our peeling at a standard that would embarrass any Senior Women’s curler, we did not manage to hold on to it and lost the game quite comfortably.

Brenda giving Scott and John peeling tips.

With all our games on Friday now complete, Scott saw an opportunity to let his dance moves loose on Aberdeen. Until 4am. Being young and full of energy, he would like to think he would manage the 9am game without any issues. Unfortunately this was not the case and he struggled to break the 15% mark on draws. One highlight of the game for him was managing to hit the 12ft in the 7th end. Despite this brush breakingly bad performance, we ran out 11-4 winners over Sergey Korolenko from Russia.

Our last game of the group stages was against David Robertson. This was a must win to qualify for the playoffs, and that is exactly what we did with the score finishing 11-4. It was a good victory although it was pretty evident that the Robertson foursome had their minds set on other things. Like spiking everybody’s drinks with vodka and travelling to Nairn for the Curler’s Court. The win qualified us 3rd in our group behind Jackie Lockhart and Jaap Van Dorp.

But before the KO stages we had the Saturday evening dinner and Horse Race.  We were seated with Team Kerry Barr for the dinner who would later be our victims in the quarter finals. Usually it is Rhiann who takes the lime light for any “special” remarks that are made. This time Kerry snatched her crown.

Rhiann – “What is Rose Wine made out of?”
Kerry – “Strawberries I think. Yeah. Definitely Strawberries”

Kerry with her "Strawberry" wine

One thing to do if you see Rhiann over the next couple of days or weeks is to ask her how to make her infamous Lemon and Lime Chicken and what she thinks of Andy Mac’s favourite nightclub game.

You will get a bite.

In the second horse race of the year, Scott was once again the Team Edwards jockey and this time there were some big bucks at stake. In the first heat, dubious “tactics” led to Scott sneaking a possibly undue victory which qualified him for the Champions of Champions final. Scott lined up in lane one with the 5 other qualifiers as the competitors were auctioned off to the crowd. Paul Stevenson had the faith and purchased Scott for a steal of £50. Following the auction and the betting it was clear Scott was far from being the favourite. This not being an issue at all, Scott raced to victory winning it by a length of a Shetland pony earning himself a bottle of Famous Grouse and Paul Stevenson a couple hundred pounds.

I would have preferred the money

After all these events it was off to bed to get some rest before the big game against Kerry, Rachel, Rhiann and Barbara. This was an absolutely massive game. The main driver for the game was pride as they would be mouthing off for so long if they were to beat us. Fortunately, we found the spanking paddle and dished out the pain. All of the Strawberry Wine they had the previous evening must have assisted in their defeat. In other games, Murray Young got beaten by Team Brewerdoch which resulted with us winning the Scottish Curling Tour! I think we get the trophy (and more importantly the money) at the Scottish next week.

This lined us up against Brewerdoch minus the Brewer in the semi. They played pretty good and beat us. We then played Jackie Lockhart in the 3/4 game for a wee bit more money which we managed to win.

Congratulations to Team Brewster who won the tournament beating Van Dorp in the final.

Team Edwards getting their money.

That is all from Team Edwards
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