A special elite program for curlers will be piloted this season.

Noticing a growing number of junior curlers with amazing talent, David Cooper, President of the Cochrane Curling Club, says they are looking to fill an identified niche. "One of the problems the Curling Club had in the past is we didn't offer an environment that attracted and retained good players. We have a good club system but beyond that there was nothing; players of an elite or higher standard tend to join a super league somewhere else like Airdrie or the Calgary Curling Club."

Wanting to make the most use of our current facility, the Cochrane Curling Club feels offering an elite program will keep people in town.

Cooper shares, focusing on the Club's junior players seemed to be the best place to start. "The reason for that is we have a couple of local teams that play for our club who are curling at a junior level but at a high standard. Instead of seeing those players drift off to other clubs that have elite programs we are looking to generate our own in-house."

Gord Copithorne is working out the logistics of the program alongside board members of the Cochrane Curling Club. Trying to keep emerging, talented curlers in town, the Club is focused on the big picture. "If the advanced level coaches are at other clubs and your players get to a particular standard where they are working with more advanced coaching staff they will go and they won't come back. For us to get the best use out of this facility here, we should demand that we are a centre of excellence."

While not every curler is of an 'excellence' standard, we do have curlers with exceptional talent. "We do have some good talent and the reason for that is we were able to offer a stable junior program that allowed kids who had never curled before to come in, get an appetite for the sport, grow into the sport, and get to stage now where they compete well at a juvenile level across the province. So our job is to make sure that the opportunities for those kids just don't wither away or now you've reached a standard where you have to look somewhere else to play the sport of your choice. We have to work hard to make those opportunities to play available here in Cochrane."

The program will start quite slowly and Copithorne will ensure the program has a number of different aspects to it. "The program is his initiative and on behalf of the Club, he will lead the project. He will bring in the suitable coaching staff whether it is technical or sports psychological, he has designed the program to make sure all the key aspects of a successful coaching program exist."

To ensure long-term viability, the pilot program will only focus on the junior players before rolling out to other curlers who are curling at an appropriate standard and looking to join an elite program. "This is where it gets interesting...if everyone is elite...no one is elite. We need to understand how we manage expectations around the elite program as we roll it out."

In order to be successful, athletes will need to meet the technical aspect as well as be physically and mentally prepared. "It's not just about, 'oh yeah, I am an elite curler, I am just going to turn up and throw some rocks and everything is going to be great'; there is a physical aspect and like any top class coach will tell you is the mental side of the game. We need to make sure our program tackles all three of those three aspects."