On March 1st the 2020 entrants into the Cobourg and District Sports Hall of Fame were announced. We are delighted to say that Cobourg member Dan Milligan will be inducted in a ceremony at the Cobourg Best Western in June. Details of the reasons for Dan's award can be found at the following link together with news of the other inductees.

​https://www.gonorthumberland.ca/2020/03/02/cobourg-and-district-sports-hall-of-fame-has-eight-new-inductees/

​Photo courtesy of Sharyl Ann Milligan

​It’s a long way to Windsor to compete in the Ontario Seniors Championships but it was all worthwhile for our ladies seniors team of Nan Hendren, Kathleen Shirley and Louisa Arthur (or “The Merry Wives of Windsor” as I have dubbed them). Accompanied by their support team and cheerleaders (Mike, Dave and yours truly) they finished fourth which is enough reason to be merry but there was also a hint of unmerriness as the result could have been better.

There were three groups of four and on Day 1 they played each other team in the group in a round robin. The top eight teams went forward to Day 2. In their first game they played a team from Walkerton and were tied coming into the last end and were down when Nan had her final shot. In good skip fashion she made the winning shot to claim victory 13-12.

The next game, against Grand Cove, was not their best and they got off to a bad start before picking up their game but it was too little, too late and they lost that game. However, they knew that a win in their final game of the day would get them into the last eight to play a quarterfinal on Day 2. They had a comfortable 16-11 win and over dinner and over dinner that night planned strategy for the next day with expert input from their husbands (OK, I might have made up that bit).

It was pretty hot on Day 1 but Day 2 threatened to be even hotter, and I don’t mean just in terms of the weather! Now the games were elimination games – lose and you go home – win the quarter final and suddenly you are in with a chance of a medal.

The quarter final was against Hanover and it was nip and tuck all the way and with a one point lead going into the final end hope was temporarily dashed when Hanover scored to tie the game which meant an extra end. Some excellent bowls from all our team in the extra end gave them three points to get them into the semi final. Win the next game and they would be in the gold medal game and book a trip to the Canadian Seniors.

There was a saying in England by a couple of soccer pundits (Saint and Greavsie may mean something to some of you) that “It’s a funny old game” and the same is true of lawn bowling. The semi final was against the Nepean team which had scraped into Day 2 with a tie break win on Day 1 but in their quarter final beat Milton (undefeated on Day 1) 16-14.

Our ladies got off to a slow start and it was clear that the main threat on the Nepean team was their skip who was an ex Team Canada member. Several times when Cobourg was sitting with multiple shots she would score and although the team bowled well they were four down going into the last end and despite scoring two they lost 13-11. That meant playing in the bronze medal game instead of the gold silver game.

After five games in two days in temperatures in the mid thirties the bronze medal game was played against the Windsor team on rink #1 right by the clubhouse and right in front of a partisan crowd. There was no doubt that the Cobourg team had better bowlers but the combination of being on an outside rink (which seemed strange) playing against a home team told early on and it took  over half the game before Cobourg got to grips with the rink and by that time they were trailing.

With five ends to go the score was 4-14. Not an impossible task, a score of two each end would tie the game. And they nearly did it. Windsor never scored again but it finished 12-14.

So that’s where the unmerriness came in but finishing fourth in Ontario is something that “The Merry Wives of Windsor” can be very proud of.
 
And I have to say that their husbands were also very proud of them.

​Bill

The Ontario Singles Youth Championships were held at club on July 6th and 7th 2019.

 Age group for youths was 12-18 and in total twenty one youths from across Ontario competed. There were separate competitions for girls and boys. Nine girls and 12 boys competed.

The club was delighted to welcome MP for Northumberland – Peterborough South, Kim Rudd and   Councillor Emily Chorley representing the Town of Cobourg. During the opening ceremonies both of them spoke about the benefits of lawn bowling as a family sport and a sport for all ages. Representing the Ontario Lawn Bowls Association Director were President Philip Francis and Director, Steve Schucknecht.

In the girls section the local favourite was Baylee van Steijn of the Cobourg club. Baylee was a silver medal winner at the Canadian Championships last year and has previously won silver in the Ontario Championships. This is her last year as a youth bowler and the pressure was on her to perform well in front of her home club.

In the boys section Cobourg representatives Dean West and Hobson McMaster were pitted against older and much more experienced bowlers but both bowled well and performed admirably and were pleased with their performances even though they were eliminated after the round robin section on day 1.

In Baylee’s round robin group there was a three way tie with each of three girls winning two and losing one game. However, based on points difference Baylee was seeded first in her group which meant she advanced direct to the semi final stage on day 2.

In her semi final game she played Cori Millard of Lindsay who had beaten her in the round robin and who had won the previous three Ontario championships. In a very tight game Baylee won 18-14 and moved on to the final to play Adrianna D’Sa of Oshawa. That was an incredibly tight game as well with excellent bowling by both players and to the delight of the home crowd Baylee took the gold medal with an 18-15 win.
​
Baylee will now represent Ontario at the Canadian Youth Championships in Juan de Fuca BC in August

Monday

It was cold (no change there) but the Monday Night Leaguers were out doing all the different things that Donna Ball dreams up. Placing the jacks in different positions and only scoring if you got within the specified distance from the jack. We started at 3 feet and gradually moved down to one foot. It’s good to have so many people playing in this league. I’m not sure what the numbers were but I think we had eight rinks in play.

Tuesday

It rained!

Wednesday

The first of the free lesson nights. It rained! Amazingly one lady came and she had personal attention as she was told all about bowling. I did demonstrate some aspects of the game on the green but it really was too wet for the lady to go out. Such a pity since the Wednesday night sessions are our major recruitment initiative. Thankfully this week looks better.

Success for Baylee van Steijn and Martin Foxhall who won a mixed pairs tournament in Peterborough.

Photo is courtesy of Peterborough LBC

Thursday

Summer arrived and we had a club tournament. 24 members competed in an 8 team triples tournament. We played two 12 end games and I heard some positive comments about the 10.00 am start from those who struggle to get out of bed in the mornings! The winning team of Janet Taylor, Norma Stoffers and Arnold Bowman finished on the same number of points as my team ( I had Ralph Stoffers and Bonnie Sheridan with me) but they had one plus point more than we did. Congratulations to them.

Friday and Saturday

The first day of play in the Ontario Fours Championships. We did not have any ladies teams competing but Bob Bates, Ben van Steijn, John MacKenzie (Oshawa) and I were competing. There were twenty men’s teams and we were split into four groups of five teams for round robin play. The top two teams in each group qualified for the quarter finals which would be elimination games.

We got off to a good start, winning our first game 15-13. We were tied coming home in the second game but lost 13-15. Third game was a similar story and we lost 14-15. This meant that we had to win our final game and hope that other results went our way. Going into that last game we knew that if we won we would be in a tie breaker for second place and we did win by 13-9. Unfortunately though we lost our 4 end tie breaker.

Martin Foxhall was also playing with his regular teammates from other clubs but they could not repeat their success of previous seasons and were eliminated after the round robin stage.

The competition was so great and teams were so evenly matched that three of the groups needed tie breakers and in one of those groups all five teams finished with 6 points which meant a five way tie breaker!

Club Cut Throat

On Saturday the club cut throat tournament, jointly sponsored by Amplifon and On Site Computer Services and Sales, was held. Obviously I wasn’t here but it sounds as though it was a good tournament which was won by Dave Shirley. I was pleased to see that some of the newer bowlers were competing.
​
Sunday
​
As I write this a Youth tournament is being played at the club but I don’t yet have the results. I’ll cover that next week.
Good Bowling
 
Bill
 

Its not exactly been lawn bowling weather so far has it? Let’s hope for some better weather in June because there is a lot happening.

Our opening day went pretty well and it was great to have a good attendance for the opening ceremonies with Mayor John Henderson and Councillor Emily Chorley who beat the Mayor’s opening bowl!
​
Our first open tournament on Victoria Day also went well but it was cold that day with a strong wind blowing. The Peterborough team of Bob Reynolds, Wayne Skivington, Larry Brown and Glen Gray really took everyone else to the cleaners with an amazing score of 54+8. As usual Lauria Hyundai had a vehicle on display but not once (in my hearing) did anyone say “Is that the prize”?​

No luck with our opening club tournament, the Coach’s Cup. We tried but the rain and the cold just became too much and we had to abandon it after one game. We will try again later in the season.

I haven’t managed a jitney yet (apart from the opening day) – the evenings have been too cold for my liking but it’s good to see that some of you have been out braving the cold. On his return to bowling after a year’s sabbatical Ralph Stoffers has gone straight into the lead in the jitney standings. I keep the results and award 3 points to the winning team, 2 to second and 1 to third. It’s just a fun thing. Sometimes I ignore the results because the full name is not shown. Which Donna? Longman or Ball? Which Ralph? Stoffers or Hewitt? Any way you get my drift. I’m not a mind reader so to make sure you get your results recorded make sure the jitney card shows the full name. I will post the full May results on the bulletin board in the club house.

We had an excellent coaching session “Introduction to Competition” from Mary Lou Richardson during May. She really is an excellent coach and her enthusiasm is catching. We have a club coaching session lined up for June 13th which is aimed at all club bowlers and hopefully we will get a good turnout for that.

It was good to see several of you out practising on Friday afternoon. If you want to get better practice is the answer. Friday afternoons are always free on the greens so it’s an ideal time to come out. If you would like some individual tuition let me or Nan Hendren know and we will try to help.

I have to give great credit to Mike Hendren and Carl Ferguson ( and their helpers) for the condition of the greens so early in the season. If you only ever play in Cobourg you probably do not realise how good they are compared with some other clubs. They do a wonderful job even though they sometimes set the sprinklers on automatic and they come on unexpectedly if you are practising! We have enough with the rain without being soaked by sprinklers.
On the subject of playing at other clubs do let me know if you get in the prize money at other clubs so that we can let others in the club know how rich you are ( I’m talking to you Bob Bates). Seriously it is good to know about outside results so do let me know of your successes.

You have hopefully noticed that the club is participating in the ParticipACTION Community Better challenge. This started o May 31st and runs to June 15th. During that period we will be keeping track of the number of people who keep active by lawn bowling at our club and will report the results to ParticipACTION. W received a grant of $500 from them to promote our activities during the first part of June and have used this to take out quarter page adverts in Northumberland News and radio adverts on Northumberland 89.7 about our free bowler evenings and our open house. ParticipACTION also has a free App available for download on your phone or tablet that allows you to record your daily activity, not just during the period of the Community Better Challenge but at all times. I’m using it to record my activities and I even won a prize for using it, a $10 Amazon gift card. Just go to the App store (Apple) or Playstore (Android) and search for ParticipAction. It’s free.
​
Good Bowling
Bill Arthur

At the time of writing we are just over one week away from our opening day on May 11th. It has been a busy off season with the construction of the new equipment garage, new drains laid and a complete upgrade of the club house electrical system.

If you are already a club member you are no doubt looking to get out on the greens again and hopefully it will start to warm up soon. Preparation of the greens is a couple of weeks behind normal but they still look in good shape and we should be ready to roll by opening day.

If you are not already a lawn bowler and have come to this page looking for information then you have come to the right place to get started, so read on

During June we are offering free lawn bowling lessons every Wednesday evening at 7.00pm. No appointments are necessary. We provide everything you need but please wear flat soled shoes or runners. These are fun evenings at which you will learn about lawn bowling from experienced club bowlers.

Also on June 15th we are holding an Open House from 10.00am until 4.00 pm. This is another opportunity to learn about the sport and try it for yourself without obligation.

The free lessons program and the Open House are part of the ParticipACTION Better Community  Challenge. ParticipAction is a non profit organisation aimed getting Canadians more active. And lawn bowling is one of the ways to achieve that objective. Click on the logo for more information about the Challenge, competitions and the free App to help you monitor your activities.

These events are sponsored by Palisade Gardens Retirement Community and we thank them for their support
​

Some of the health benefits of lawn bowling are:

• Fitness – improvement of muscle strength and flexibility
• Mental Health – fresh air and alleviation of depression and anxiety
• An increase in problem solving skills and improvements in co-ordination and concentration
• Improved confidence, self esteem and connection to community
• Improving social skills and gaining a sense of belonging

And besides all that it is fun!

Click here for information about membership fees and the special introductory rate for new bowlers

​Also check out the videos on our YouTube channel

If you have any questions please contact us at cobourg.lbc@gmail.com or post your question in the comments section below

See you on the greens

Bill Arthur
​President
.