McArthur Island Curling Club preparing for surge of new members.

“I have a learn to curl for seniors clinic that’s on this Saturday,” says McArthur Island Club manager Andrew McDiarmid. “That’s for anybody that wants to join our Tuesday and Thursday Leagues in the morning. If they’ve never curled before they can join our clinic — that includes your entrance for the first half of seniors curling.”

While membership only accounts for a percentage of revenue at the Kamloops Curling Club, with food, beverage, banquets, pro shop and sponsors accounting for the rest, McArthur Island’s is all through memberships and sponsors.

“We have a slighly lower operating cost and we don’t rely on the bar or banquet like they do in order to facilitate a majority of their budget.” says club president Kevin Ihlen. “We get all of our budget from our members.”

McArthur Island club president Kevin Ihlen says current membership is about 300 —- but they’re gearing up for a surge of new members following the closure of the Kamloops Club for the 2020-2021 season.

“We had a flood of requests the day that the announcement went out for sure. They continue to come in, so we’ll probably grow to a four or five hundred member club.”

Safety guidelines will be a big part of the new season because of the pandemic — social distancing on the ice between teammates and opponents with areas marked out on the ice where non sweepers will stand. Only one sweeper is allowed ——— and for those skips who loath sweeping ——- no sweeping of the opponents rock behind the house t-line. And cleaning —- lots of cleaning.

“Cleaning the rocks after every game, cleaning all of the equipment after every game, the handles after games.” says Kevin Ihlen. “That was the biggest part of working with Curl B.C. and Curl Canada throughout the summer to determine what we had to do between games and on a continuous basis to make sure that we kept our members safe.”

So with membership expected to grow substantially — perhaps even double —- will there be enough time and space to handle it?

“We’re going to do everything we can to make sure that everyone who wants to curl this year is able to curl.”

by Earl Seitz

McArthur Island Curling Club preparing for surge of new members.

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