EDMONTON - All hail Hans.

That was the common message as curlers ventured off the ice after their first practice sessions on Saturday for the Tim Hortons Roar of the Rings Olympic curling trials at Rexall Place.
Head icemaker Hans Wutrich and assistant Dave Merklinger have the four sheets of ice swinging just to the curler’s liking.

“It’s fantastic. Hans and Dave are the best icemakers out there, you couldn’t ask for better. There’s lots of swing, which is the way we like it,” said Lori Olson-Jones, an Edmontonian who throws third stones for Calgary’s Crystal Webster. “You can make everything on ice like this.”
Each of the 16 rinks competing had an hour of practice, moving from sheet to sheet in 15-minute intervals in preparation for Sunday’s start to the event, which will determine Canada’s Olympic reps for the Vancouver Games.

“It was a little heavy to start off with, but I think that’s just the icemakers making sure the pebble holds up for today,” said Saskatchewan’s Amber Holland. “It’ll be good. It’s always good. There’s a lot of swing and those rocks - you know they’re going to finish and finish hard.”
There was plenty of movement on Saturday.

“It’s pretty keen and it’s curling a lot, which we love, so we couldn’t ask for more,” said Calgary’s Cheryl Bernard.

“You can tell it’s still breaking in a little, on the heavy side, but it’ll be a lot quicker as the week goes on,” said Kelowna, B.C.’s, Kelly Scott. “There’s curl out there. You can go into the far 12-foot and it curls right to the centre line. You can make any shot out there. It curls to the wings, it curls to centre and certainly it’s very weight sensitive. If you under-throw a hit or over-throw a hit you’ll really get a different amount of curl so that’s where communication and that precision will come in.”

It’s interesting to note, that original plans to use the actual Olympic rocks for this event (which were used in Prince George, B.C., for pre-trials) were scuttled by the World Curling Federation.

mannicchiarico@thejournal.canwest.com