Old Traditions fading . New Ones Beginning.
Leaside: Joe Davis Mens Mixed Trebles
When I started bowling back in 1989 there were 2 great Mens Trebles tournaments at Leaside . . . must stops on the men’s local circuit . . entries from players across the GTA. (Of course it wasn’t the GTA then . . just Toronto & the suburbs). Enter early or you were left behind. The Joe Davis in the spring & the Cy English in the fall . . . greens guaranteed to be in top shape of course . . Lloyd Woods was in charge.
Those were the days . . 96 men in white pants (no colours allowed) . . 288 black or brown Henselites or Taylors (and Dunlops) on the green (no other colours existed) . . . getting clobbered by the Alf Kirton, Al Ferguson, Jim Ellieff trio (well, all memories aren’t so great) but learned how to play winning bowls while getting thumped. As Yogi put it . . . “You can observe something just by watching”.
Today those rumblings under foot aren’t tremors from the volcano in Iceland . . that’s the heaving of the ground from old time Skips rolling over as the two grand old east Toronto events have now officially departed. After a few years of lagging entries (down to about 14 as I recall in 2008) the Cy English was put to rest in 2009. This year the Joe Davis was changed to a Mixed Treble’s event to see if the number of entries could improve. Not too bad . . 18 entries on Sunday . . ok for many clubs . . but still disappointing for an event that was always filled to overflowing. Maybe the Mens event will return to try again.
Why the lag in entries . . maybe a topic for another day. Most entrants on Sunday were unaware that they were part of a change in Leaside’s traditional ways. Didn’t faze the winners one bit. Arnie Markowitz / Hazel Jaffe / Sum Tang were #1 followed by the Charlie Lyle team from Burlington.
Despite Leaside dropping the event you still have a chance to win the Cy English Trophy . . maybe a little harder to earn than winning Leaside’s event. It was won the last 2 years by the Ontario ‘B’ team as the top Mens team at the Canadian Championships. (Which Arnie & Sum were part of last year).
One down note at the event. There was a prize (Entry Fee back) given out in a lucky draw for teams that weren't in the regular prize money. A ploy used by many clubs to keep players there until the prizes are given out by their sponsor. Unfortunately the sponsor had to draw out 6 team names from the hat before they got to one that hadn't already left. The absentee's loss (of $45) was Remi's gain . . . but also a loss to show the sponsor that many participants really didn't know or care that the sponsor was there supporting the club.
New Traditions Beginning . . . The Richard Bruton Trophy at Insert Name of Club Here.
Three or 4 years ago Financial Advisor Richard Bruton (Cannacord Wealth Management) was encouraged by client Mike Vince (Cosburn President) to sponsor a tournament at Cosburn Park. He gladly agreed to do it and the 1st Cannacord Classic MP was born.
It has now spawned several brother & sister events as Richard last year sponsored tournaments in at least 8 different clubs. The first one this year was the Victoria Day Open Fours at Coburg. Richard doesn’t just support his events with cash (quite a generous amount I might add) . . he is on hand with good lucky draw prizes along with bottles of champagne & strawberries for all to toast the winners (and the Queen) at the end of the day. He even played in the tournament with Jim Smith. Bravo Richard (and Jim).
Another tradition . . Wayne Wallwork (Al Purcell, Al Handlecher, Vera Richardson) winning the Coburg Open Fours . . the only winner of the event in its long 2 yr history. Will have to have a talk with the draw masters (Laura Hawryszko / Susan Smith) next year. They helped Wayne both years by pitting my team against him in the 3rd game. Second place captured by the Bob Matthews team from Peterborough. They were down 2 points after 11 but managed to score 3 in the last end (against Pauline Hill) to take the 3rd game.
Norm Smith (Matthew’s team) was fresh off winning 3 in Oshawa on Saturday where he had graciously thanked Bob Guppy (also on Matthews team) and Matthews for going to Burlington & letting him run the team in Oshawa without interference for once. Looks like he can win with them or without them.
Points were hard to come by this day as Wayne won with just 38 pts and I believe Matthews took 3 games with 34 points. As always . . no matter what he does . .Gord Terwilligar seems to get in the money. Just scored 29 points but was the high 1 gamer.
Now . . all preliminaries behind us . . off to the Fours.
BB in the GTA (and Coburg)
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