Three local curlers took part in the Gold Nugget Bonspiel in Atlin, B.C. recently.

The team consisted of Rick Avery, skip, Gilbert Goulet, second and Sarah Wolfe, lead. Scott Cole of Atlin was the third.

The team explained how they got their nickname, ‘Hack Attack’, during the bonspiel.

“I was in about the fifth or sixth end, I guess,” said Avery. “I kicked off and I thought ‘That’s kind of funny’, because I didn’t get the usual feel of a push. And after I released it and the rock was going – was it you (Wolfe) that told me?

“I said, ‘Are you okay?’ cause I saw the hack go flying,” said Wolfe.

“Flying backwards, right,” said Avery. “It just let go of the ice. So anyway, that caused a bit of a conundrum for a while and they had to repair it and put it back, so the game took much longer than it should have been.

“And then the next game, he’s (Goulet) kicking out and bang! It goes.”

“I couldn’t let go of the rock,” said Goulet.

“So they repaired it,” said Avery. “And he got it again and he kicked it and a second time it went flying out.

“So if we had known we would have called ourselves ‘Hack Attack.’”

“But then I wasn’t able to make my shots afterward,” recalled Goulet.

“No, cause the next end he was thinking it’s gonna break, so he was braced for it and he fell over both times,” related Avery.

Wolfe shouted “Hack Attack!

“Sorry. We have to scream and we have to get this going. Like, we have a brand now.”

The bonspiel took place Jan. 21-22.

“We played our game here (Friday in Whitehorse) and got in the car early on Saturday morning and our first draw was 11 o’clock,” said Avery. “It was a very small event. There were only nine teams, which is a really annoying number if you’re arranging the draw.”

“They did a great job with the draw. It was creative,” said Wolfe.

Avery said “It was really interesting.”

“They only have a two sheet club. They’ve got a real old school small town curling club,” said Wolfe.

“It’s gorgeous,” added Avery.

It was Avery’s first time at the Gold Nugget Bonspiel.

“I have,” said Wolfe. “I haven’t been back there for several years and I think they had shut down completely. They probably weren’t running their ‘spiel for the last few years. But yeah, I’ve been there before a few times.”

“That was the great part about curling in Atlin,” said Wolfe. “So I go in there – I think we figured it was seven years since the last time I’d been back there. And it’s like walking into Cheers. You know, like everyone knows your name.”

It was Goulet’s first time there as well.

Each team played four games.

The “Hack Attack’ ended up with two wins and two losses in the bonspiel.

“Which, for a Friday night team, ain’t bad,” chimed Avery.

Because there were nine teams, the bonspiel was divided into three groups of three, who all played each other. After that, there was a bracket format.

Avery said, “All of our groups were 1-1 because everybody won one, lost one. Kind of unusual, but that’s how it came out. And so we got moved into the middle bracket and that’s where we stayed and we won one and lost one in that. So that put us exactly in the middle when they handed out the prizes.”

“We were dead centre,” Wolfe added.

“We were right in the middle,” said Avery. “So I was pretty pleased with that.

“We could have played better. But we made some good shots too. I made a couple of absolute doozies. People were talking about it. And then I missed some really easy wide open hits. I should have made those hits. If I had we would have been further up the draw, I’m pretty sure.”

Wolfe: “Going some place else is always a little bit of a challenge. It’s kind of fun. The ice is totally different.”

The group was asked if they won anything.

“The prizes there are incredible,” exclaimed Avery. “The top prizes there were three-gram gold nuggets. The market value for those was about $400. The draw to the button was a nugget twice that size. Eight or $900.” Goulet said that nugget weighed six grams.

“He (Goulet) got a day at the cabin that we stayed at, which was $200 a night,” said Avery.

“A lot of great sponsorships,” added Goulet.

“I got a piece of local art,” related Wolfe. “So that was wonderful.”

“I got a really top-end Spirit Level,” said Avery. There were a lot of prizes left. They had so few teams. I think they had enough prizes for probably 12 or 16 teams.”

“I love that about this,” Wolfe said. “It’s still that sort of old fashioned small town bonspiel. So everybody stays for the closing.”

There were a few highlights for the team, besides the flying hacks of course.

“Meeting the locals, mingling with them, getting to know them,” said Goulet. “I wanted some handmade mittens so the colours that I wanted weren’t there, but the person was more than willing to make some for me. She sent me a picture and she’s just like, ‘When do you want me to deliver them?’”

“We went back to our room and I was the band for the night,” recalled Avery. “I picked up my guitar and we just sat in the room and sang for a couple of hours. That probably was a highlight for me. I haven’t sat around with people and sung for a long time, other than (his wife) Judy.”

“Especially people with the same oddball repertoire,” chimed in Wolfe.

When asked if they would go back next year, Avery replied “Oh, I think so. I would love to go back.”

“It used to be a regular on my calendar,” added Wolfe. “I would put it right back on there in a heartbeat. I love curling there.”