What's in store for the weekend?

Tommy Campbell and his Lanarkshire team will be trying for a fourth consecutive Senior Mixed title as that championship gets underway at Stranraer tomorrow (Friday). The event was postponed from earlier in the season, but there are still sixteen teams in the draw (here).

Lockerbie is the venue for the annual Junior Invitation competition. Juniors are also competing at Braehead in the Festive Cup. Just why junior events have to clash on the same weekend is a mystery to me - there are few enough opportunities for our young curlers to compete. But maybe I'm just being grumpy again!

Still, given the choice for seasonal good will, I would be headed south. Fenton's rink in Kent, which is England's only dedicated curling rink, is having the world's first Santa Claus Bonspiel, which will see twenty-four Santas on the ice. The event is in aid of local charity, Hospice in The Weald! See here.

Jingle Bells to you too.

Top: Tommy Campbell. Pic by Bob.

Scottish Curler cartoonist, the talented Ian Rodney of the Alternative CC, drew this Santa curling for the Christmas issue in 2004!

A busy junior weekend

Lockerbie Junior Invitation winners: L-R Glen Muirhead, Scott Macleod, Gordon McDougall and Scott Andrews. Photo by Bob.

Lockerbie Junior Invitation winners: L-R Sarah Macintyre, Vicki Adams, Kerry Barr and Eve Muirhead. Photo by Bob.

Junior curling was very much to the fore at the weekend. Ten girls' teams and sixteen boys' teams competed in the Lockerbie Junior Invitation. Eve Muirhead's side defeated Kay Adams' team in the final of the junior women's competition. Glen Muirhead beat Jamie Dick for the junior men's trophy.

A full entry of sixteen teams were at Braehead for the Festive Cup on Saturday. The format of five end games in a strongly contested under-21 section saw Stuart Dodds and David Miller match up in the final. David won 4 - 2. In the oversubscribed under-16 section Andrew Ballantyne beat Hamilton McMillan in the last game.

Festive Cup U-16 winners: Hazel Smith, Euan Paterson, Andrew Ballantyne and Andrew Neilson. Photo by Corinne Shand.

Festive Cup U-21 winners: David Miller, Greg Matthew, Gary Cannell, Fraser Davidson. Photo by Corinne Shand.