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Macartney to travel to Scotland to compete in curling tournament
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TOPSAIL VOICE
By Connie Pletl
N. TOPSAIL BEACH – Curling became very well known after it was widely televised during the 2010 Winter Olympics.
What may not be well know is that North Topsail Beach resident and town alderman Dick Macartney is a member of an American curling team that will travel to Scotland this week to compete against Scottish teams.
Twenty men from across the US were selected out of over 70 applicants for the American team. The 20 were then divided into five teams of four.
Each team will play two matches most days from Jan. 28 to Feb. 19. They will compete in 20 different venues across Scotland, beginning in Glasgow and ending in Edinburgh.
Macartney met his teammates for the first time late last year in Chicago.
The men found that they worked well as a team. They competed against 40 other American teams and took first place, winning the Continental Cup.
Macartney said he began curling in 1973. He was stuck in a hotel room in Albany, NY one snowy evening when a coworker came by and invited him to go curling.
“I said to him, ‘What’s that?’” said Macartney.
He went to try it out and found out that he liked it.
“It combines fellowship and competition, two things I enjoy. You have the match and then you go for libations,” explained Macartney.
After his first experience with the sport, Macartney moved several times. Sometimes he was in an area where he participated in curling, other times he was not.
He played in Omaha, NE from 1985-86 and then did not play again until he moved to Topsail Island during the 1990s and joined the Triangle Curling Club of Raleigh.
He is still a member of that club but he and his wife have started a new curling club – Coastal Carolina Curling Club — at the Ice House in Wilmington.
That club currently has 18 members but Macartney said they would like about 24-30 more.
“Anyone can do this,” he said, noting that there are 165 curling clubs around the country.
Each match takes about two hours. One player slides a heavy polished granite stone down the ice toward a target while two teammates sweep the ice in front of the stone with brooms to influence its trajectory.
The fourth teammate, known as the Skip, orchestrates the action from behind target, which is known as the house.
Each team tries to position its stones to gain the highest score.
When Macartney travels to Scotland, the American teams will try to win back the coveted Herries-Maxwell Trophy. Ten years ago Scotland teams came to America to compete and took home the trophy.
Macartney has started a blog https://sites.google.com/site/scottour2012/home so that those at home can follow the American teams during the USCA Scotland Tour.
What may not be well know is that North Topsail Beach resident and town alderman Dick Macartney is a member of an American curling team that will travel to Scotland this week to compete against Scottish teams.
Twenty men from across the US were selected out of over 70 applicants for the American team. The 20 were then divided into five teams of four.
Each team will play two matches most days from Jan. 28 to Feb. 19. They will compete in 20 different venues across Scotland, beginning in Glasgow and ending in Edinburgh.
Macartney met his teammates for the first time late last year in Chicago.
The men found that they worked well as a team. They competed against 40 other American teams and took first place, winning the Continental Cup.
Macartney said he began curling in 1973. He was stuck in a hotel room in Albany, NY one snowy evening when a coworker came by and invited him to go curling.
“I said to him, ‘What’s that?’” said Macartney.
He went to try it out and found out that he liked it.
“It combines fellowship and competition, two things I enjoy. You have the match and then you go for libations,” explained Macartney.
After his first experience with the sport, Macartney moved several times. Sometimes he was in an area where he participated in curling, other times he was not.
He played in Omaha, NE from 1985-86 and then did not play again until he moved to Topsail Island during the 1990s and joined the Triangle Curling Club of Raleigh.
He is still a member of that club but he and his wife have started a new curling club – Coastal Carolina Curling Club — at the Ice House in Wilmington.
That club currently has 18 members but Macartney said they would like about 24-30 more.
“Anyone can do this,” he said, noting that there are 165 curling clubs around the country.
Each match takes about two hours. One player slides a heavy polished granite stone down the ice toward a target while two teammates sweep the ice in front of the stone with brooms to influence its trajectory.
The fourth teammate, known as the Skip, orchestrates the action from behind target, which is known as the house.
Each team tries to position its stones to gain the highest score.
When Macartney travels to Scotland, the American teams will try to win back the coveted Herries-Maxwell Trophy. Ten years ago Scotland teams came to America to compete and took home the trophy.
Macartney has started a blog https://sites.google.com/site/scottour2012/home so that those at home can follow the American teams during the USCA Scotland Tour.
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Uncle Buck wrote on Jan 25, 2012 10:39 AM:
Way to go Dick! "