KW Classic.
Thursday morning was not without a training load. We headed to the gym at 10 to get an hour in before taking on the Japanese. The Nakajima team that awaits us from 18.30 is very young, but they have a fourth place from last year's World Championships, which is a respectable showing. The 60-minute practice session is important mainly because the local icemaker sharpened the stones during the night today, which turned the somewhat non-spinning track into a very spinning track. It's the kind of ice where if the skip reacts to a change in trajectory, it's too late. You need to anticipate and let the throwers excel two or three metres before the swing starts. During the day, we got in good spirits with a great lunch at a "well rated" restaurant and coffee at an "even better rated" café and headed for the hall at 5:30. The journey is commendably short. Ten minutes at most by car. There are more of Jim's surprises waiting for us in the lobby window. An enlarged, printed Misha in a handstand position, taken from our profile photo, pasted on the other side of the glass, and also a life-size, paper-cut version of my face arranged to match the T-shirt we gave Jim. He's just a creative guy who "threatens" to get on other people's nerves, but then adds that he's "Easy to be nice to nice people." The match itself is evenly matched, four to four after six ends. We go for one in the seventh and add one more in the eighth. Tomorrow at 10:30, another opponent. Main photo: Misha appreciates Jim's creation photo below: Anna and Seina measuring together.
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