Team SK Daily Blog #1 – Canadian Mixed Championship

Hello from SWAN RIVER, MANITOBA!

Today is finally here (we all felt like it would never come)!

Everyone that will be following this week may already know us, but I’d like to take a second to introduce your Mixed Team Sask from the lead’s perspective 😉

Bruce Korte – I speak for the entire team when I say that we are so happy Bruce agreed to join our team (although I don’t think he fully understood what he was getting into). Bruce is not only our skip, but our coach, mentor, and manager (which is greatly needed if you’ve ever met Jayden). We’re so happy to have his wife, Marj, and daughters Britni, Robyn and Lace cheering hard for us. Bruce is a customer-service rep for Hewlett-Packard, enjoys brewing his own beer (which is without question the best beer in Saskatchewan), singing, and playing pranks. Little does he know the rest of the team might have a few pranks up our sleeves as well..

 

Brett Barber – Brett is our beautiful blonde bombshell, owner of New U Fitness in Biggar, personal trainer and nutritionist. She is a farm girl through and through, Dallas Cowboys and Habs fan, loves her puppy Duke, curling naps (she’s napping right now) and helping make a difference in her community through making people healthier. She’s our team chef, because she somehow makes everything healthy taste delicious.

Jayden Shwaga – I’m not sure where to begin He’s an associate account manager at RBC in Yorkton, and helps on his family farm near Wroxton. Shwags is the kinda guy who will probably win most arm wrestles, will pick up a curling rock to move it instead of kicking it, and basically speaks in his own language. Atta you, Jayden. Atta you. We stopped at his family’s farm on the way to Swan River, where he started up the “Q” to grill us up some steaks.

Myself (Robyn Despins) – I’m a coffee loving pharmacist from Prince Albert who is incredibly grateful to be in Swan River with my wonderful teammates, and excited to see what the week brings!

An extra special honorable mention to our original skip, Colton Flasch. We had a little bit too much fun with him at provincials, so we thought in order to get serious for nationals, we should probably swap him out

Just kidding!

We were happy to cheer on Colton, Kevin, Dan and Matt at the Road to the Roar Pre-Trials in PEI last week.

We arrived in Swan River on Saturday around 8:00pm, chatted, played some pool, and had an early night.

This morning, we headed to the Swan River Curling Club, where we had practice at 10:00am. The facility is beautiful, people are friendly, volunteers are incredibly helpful, and we had a really good practice! We’re excited to get on the ice tonight for our first game at 7:00pm.