National Post (National Edition)
Homan rink taking care of business
By the time Rachel Homan, Emma Miskew, Lisa Weagle and Joanne Courtney take off from Toronto on a 13 1/2-hour flight to Beijing at 3:40 p.m. Monday, they should have a pretty good handle on the 12-hour time difference.
On Thursday, they started going to bed an hour later and waking up an hour later in the morning to try and get on China time. By the time they leave, they will be staying up until 3 a.m. and waking up at noon. Getting to Beijing four days before the women’s world curling championships begin on Saturday should give them enough time to make further adjustments.
In her third attempt at winning a world championship (with a bronze and silver already in the books), the 27-year-old skip — the youngest Canadian to win three Scotties — is thinking about much more than what happens on the ice.
“We have a plan in place to help us get acclimatized to the time change faster,” said Homan, whose team, along with coach Adam Kingsbury, was given a nice sendoff by the supportive Ottawa Curling Club Saturday night. “Hopefully when we land, we’ll be right on Beijing time and it won’t be as long to get accustomed to their schedule. Even if it doesn’t work perfectly, we still have four days to get used to the jet lag. I’m just excited to get that long flight over with and get over there.”
“We know it’s going to be a big adjustment so we’re doing as much as we can,” said Weagle.
Homan advanced to the world championships with an 8-6 win over Manitoba’s Michelle Englot at the Scotties Tournament of Hearts. Thinking about how to prepare for a trip to China, Homan got advice from several others, including members of Kevin Koe’s rink which competed and fell short at the men’s worlds in Beijing in 2014.
One piece of advice was to be careful with the food so they will take along plenty of protein bars, shakes, oatmeal and almond butter — comforts of home.
“We’re taking along things that will give us a taste of home,” said Weagle. “We’ve got a lot of recommendations, a list of restaurants and things to expect so we trust in them. We’re going to a grocery store when we get there and try and find some things we can have in our room. We’re going to manage the best we can. When we travel, it’s nice to embrace local culture and cuisine, but when you’re curling you really don’t want to mess around with new foods.”
Once they get locked into their curling zone, the Homan team will try and shut out everything else.
“We go a bit early so we’ll be able to see a few things and enjoy it a bit,” said Homan. “But your focus is curling when you’re there. People say you get to travel all over and it must be so exciting, but mostly the focus is on rest when you can and get ready for your games. There’s not much time to do anything else.
“You’re sleeping, trying to find food that’s going to energize you for your game. A 10-day event, it’s very taxing. I think we’re the only country that had to be 23 games to get there, back to back to back. We had a eight-day tournament, then a 10-day tournament, now we’re going overseas to play another 10-day tournament. It’ll be a great experience, we’ll tour around a bit for a couple of days — I can’t wait — but then it’s just curling focus.”
Thankfully, there won’t be a lot of travel time while on the ground.
“The location for the hotel and venue are going to be great, they’re just kind of across the freeway,” said Homan. “So we won’t be spending too much time travelling to and from which gives us a bit of extra time for recovery.”
As the team’s coach, Kingsbury has been trying to leave no rock unturned, trying to plot a clear path for his team to have not only a good performance, but a great performance — with one eye looking ahead at the Roar of the Rings, the Olympic trials in Ottawa in December.
“I don’t think we can understate the importance of the preparation enough,” said Kingsbury. “Everyone talks about how jet lag is an important thing and it must be maintained. From a performance standpoint, we have a pretty good idea now of precisely what that recipe needs to be.
“My goal is going to be overseeing everything we’ve worked on really from August onward. None of this right now is flying by the seat our pants. We’ve had a number of rehearsals. If the last month is any indication of how good this team is performing, we shouldn’t expect anything but a great two weeks.”
As for the Roar of the Rings, Homan said: “It’s a great opportunity, no other team is going have this opportunity to play internationally before the trials. We’re trying to take advantage of that. We’re trying to learn from the whole experience of provincials and nationals, then going into worlds. Then after it’s all said and done, evaluate how it went, how we prepared and what worked and what didn’t, then apply that in the trials when the time comes. Right now we’re excited about the opportunity to represent our country and we really have to stay focused on the worlds.”