WCF President Les Harrison of Canadaby Rodger Schmidt
CORTINA D’AMPEZZO, Italy – It is getting to the middle of the round robin with pretty much the usual suspects staying at the top of the leader board. All the rest are trying to stay away from four losses, in order to stay in contention for a playoff spot or a tiebreaker. Good plan this year, but a bad plan for next year because tiebreakers will probably be a thing of the past in these curling competitions after Wednesday’s World Curling Federation meetings.
But what else goes – or stays – come Wednesday is anyone’s guess. There are a lot of delegates that will vote on a mass of issues and most are currently holding their votes where no one can see them. And as these votes are cast by secret ballot, all will be secret for the rest of history.
But there’s more. The impact of what could go down as Black Wednesday in Cortina for many of the curling rules we have come to work with... is also going to include a nasty election day.
There is a coup in the works intended to take out the WCF President, Canada’s own Les Harrison (CCA photo by Michael Burns) in the form of the sitting Vice-President running for election against the sitting President. This is something rarely heard of in a sport federation such as the WCF, and word on the street is that the junta orchestrating this hostile takeover may indeed have enough votes to take power.
More on this one later!