From Torino to Vancouver: Team Gushue's drive to repeat as Olympic champions

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From Torino to Vancouver:

Team Gushue's drive to repeat as Olympic champions

While Canadian sports fans are glued to their television sets watching our athletes run through the thick Beijing smog, it's hard to believe that only a short eighteen months from now the world will turn its focus to Canada for the 2010 Winter Olympics. It'll be an Olympic year where Canada hopes to dominate; raking in medals for speed-skating, skiing, curling, and—with any luck—mens ice hockey. The Canadian Olympic Committee says it will be a record breaking year for Canada, believing that Canada may sit atop the medal standings in 2010 due to the "Own The Podium" campaign.

Two medals that Canada can certainly count on receiving in 2010 will come from the mens and womens curling event. Ever since the Olympics started handing out medals for curling in Nagano, Japan, back in 1998, Canada has always made it on to the podium. The legendary Sandra Schmirler claimed gold in that first Olympic curling competition. Despite remaining a dominate curling power, Canada did not see Olympic gold again for a long time. It took eight years until Canada once again climbed to the top of the podium. And that feat was accomplished, as we all know, by Team Gushue. A gold medal isn't enough to make the 2006 champ step back, though. Gushue wants to go again and win a second Olympic gold, this time, at home.

Leading up to the Olympic trials in 2005, there was no doubt that the Gushue guys were skilled. It seemed that shots most curlers only joked about attempting were routine for the guys from The Rock. After making triple run-back through-the-port quadruple take-outs, it made people wonder if there was any shot too hard for the Newfoundlanders. But as every curler knows all too well, weight and accuracy is only one part of the game. The other part is strategy; being able to read your opponent and force them to take shots they're more likely to miss . . . taking control of the end and setting up the rocks in a way to leave the skip their favorite shot. It's a gift that is only perfected through experience, and despite how skilled Team Gushue was, they were all in their twenties and would have to compete with teams who have been playing curling before Gushue was even conceived.

Enter Russ Howard. A name synonymous with curling and the guy who is partly to credit for curling even being an Olympic sport. It was Howard who introduced the "Moncton rule", which we now called the "free guard zone" rule. Without this rule, the game of curling was far less exciting and likely would never have been considered as an Olympic event. But beyond being an inventor of interesting rules, Russ Howard comes with a playbook thicker than any other. He brought a wealth of experience that, when combined with the skills of Team Gushue, made an incredible force to be reckoned with.

Don't get me wrong. Gushue's strategy was strong and he knew which shots to call. He had a great deal of experience himself heading into the 2005 Olympic trials, having won a world junior title and making multiple Brier appearances. Mark Nichols, who plays third, also had some experience to bring to the table after skipping Newfoundland to a Canadian mixed title. But with Russ Howard holding the broom, the strategy was seemless.

"Having Russ on the team did help us win the gold," Gushue told Curling Scoops this week. "Any team in the world would benefit from having someone with that much experience on their team."

Brad Gushue came home from Italy with more than just gold, though. He returned packed with experience and new strategies passed on from Howard.

"I think we have learned a lot from him and can use that towards our run towards Vancouver," Gushue said.

After his trip to Italy, Gushue seemed to acquire a taste for gold. He has been very open about his desire to play at the Olympics again, tweaking his lineup between seasons in an attempt to find that perfect mix again. This led him to recently pick up former teammate and fellow Olympian Jamie Korab, who was absent from the team last season. Ryan Fry, who played with Jeff Stoughton last year, was also added to the line up.

So what exactly makes a great curler into an Olympian? The type of training involved is not really all that different from the rigorous training routine already being carried out by elite teams like the Gushue rink. What does change, however, is when that training occurs.

Summer training seems like something the Gushue squad will be doing a lot. The new version of Team Gushue was given the honour to play for Canada at a warm-up event in Russia this summer, giving a strong performance and coming up just short against David Murdoch in the championship game. The team normally would want their performance to peak at the Brier in March, but the timing will need to change in 2009. "We need to adjust our schedule to try and get on the ice earlier and intensify our training earlier in the summer so we are ready to peak in December," Gushue told us. "Other then the timing, we don’t change too much."

December would certainly be a great time to peak. The Canadian Olympic curling trials, dubbed the "Roar of the Rings", will take place December 6-13, 2009. The trials are thought to be tougher to win than the Olympics themselves.

As awesome of an experience as the 2006 Olympics were, Gushue believes that the curling tournament in Vancouver will have a different feel than the Torino games. "The atmosphere in Vancouver will be totally different," he said. "It will probably be the hottest ticket in Vancouver and there will be a packed house for just about every game."

With the Beijing games almost behind us, we'll now wait anxiously for Canada's time to shine in 2010. Of all Olympic sports, none look more promising for Canada than curling. There's little question that Canada is the curling capital of the world. Never is there a world championship where the Canadian team is not feared and respected. But with such huge expectations and a capacity crowd of 6,000 filling Vancouver's Hillcrest/Nat Bailey Stadium Park, that intense atmosphere could disrupt the focus of Team Canada. But the pressure shouldn't bother Gushue if he ends up as the one representing Canada in 2010.

"For our team, I think it would be a huge motivator. We would know that we have the support of the crowd and we would try and embrace that."