Not all bonspiels fill up these days but once again Bentley attracted a full complement of 32 teams in their recent Bentley Seniors’ Bonspiel.
There were four draws a day, only one game a day and no evening curling, which the seniors like. There were cash prizes.
In the A event, the undefeated champions were the Jim Bruns rink from Lacombe with skip Ed Rice, second Arnie MacAskill and lead Ann Rice. They defeated the Ken Brown foursome in six ends, making the Norm Crossman rink third and the Cliff Knutson team fourth.
The B event was won by Bill Samuel from Red Deer with skip Earl Carson, second Bill Edmonds and lead Nancy Carritt. The Rainy Creek Doug Culshaw team ran out of rocks in the eighth end so the Dave Neufeld team ended up third, and Dwight Homan’s team was fourth.
With the modified draw, there were two winners in the C event. They were the Gary Sparrow team with Jim Morris, Terry Widdifield and Monna Sparrow and the Merlyn Wilson group with Gail Wilson, Clem Arnold and George Weenink. Sparrow defeated John Stol in the last end after being tied 5-5 coming home, and Wilson defeated Ralph Scarlett who he ran out of rocks in the eighth end.
The D event was played out to the fours, so there were four teams who shared the cash prizes. They were the teams of Chris Jensen, Lorne Stewart, Merle Craven, and Ken Cookson.
This year’s bonspiel organizer Ralph Scarlett was pleased to have the 32 teams again. Most years the Bentley Seniors Spiel has been full but the bonspiel had gone two years with only 30 teams.
“Of all the teams that I called that were in it last year only four didn’t come back this year,” Scarlett said. “And support remained excellent,” he added, with donors and sponsors remaining loyal and generous.