Local curlers David Daoust and Manon Paquette know exactly how the American mixed doubles tandem of Sean Franey and BriAnna Weldon must feel.

Well, perhaps not quite “exactly” how they feel. Maybe a “little” of how they feel.

When Daoust and Paquette first decided to begin partaking in the relatively new phenomenon that was mixed doubles curling few years ago, their best option, travel-wise, was to play on a circuit out of Québec, one of the first to jump aboard the sport that has grown in leaps and bounds.

“At that time, southern Ontario was just starting their tour and the idea of getting events closer to home interested me,” noted Daoust. “Last year, as I played events in southern Ontario, I started talking to teams to see what kind of interest there might be for an event in Sudbury.”

“Could we fill an event here.”

Such was the genesis of the inaugural Northern Credit Union Mixed Doubles Open last weekend, hosted at the NCUCC, a bonspiel that welcomed 17 teams to town (due to one late Thursday dropout): nine from southern Ontario, seven from northern Ontario, one team from Japan, as well as the Franey/Weldon combo who made the trek from Denver, Colorado.

If Daoust and Paquette thought their travel arrangements to La Belle Province were daunting, consider for a moment a schedule that sees your flight leave Denver on Thursday evening, arriving in Detroit around midnight at which point you rent a car and make the eight hour drive to Sudbury with just enough time to relax, for a few hours, before playing your first game mid-afternoon on Friday.

“We looked at the three events that were happening this weekend and punched them into Google Maps,” explained Franey, shortly after his team was eliminated in quarter-final action with an 8-3 loss to the St Thomas duo of Scott McDonald and Laura Neil Sunday morning. “They were all achievable, but for us, the big thing is the points driver.”

Thankfully, Daoust had managed to secure the new event a spot on both the Ontario Mixed Curling Tour calendar as well as earning tier 3 status as a World Curling Federation qualifying competition, creating the lure to the U.S. based pairing who only began curling in their mid-twenties.

“In the States, we might only have four mixed doubles events all year that are tour events,” said Franey. “In Canada, pretty much every province has its own tour with seven, eight, nine events.”

“For us, it’s so much easier just to figure out what weekends we have free and what events are happening that weekend.”

Easier, though not necessarily easy.

Still, ‘twas a factor that played heavily into the organizational template that David Daoust created in order to create a draw of curling talent that would generate a snowball effect, with entries accumulating based on who else was registering out of the gate – as well as a few other key items.

“It was mostly the timing, the scheduling of the event,” he said. “If you are too far away from other events, there is not a lot of incentive for the big travelling teams to attend. The Japanese team (Chiaki Matsumura and Yasumasa Tanida captured the Open thanks to an 8-3 win over Sudbury native Megan Smith and Newmarket partner Doug Thomson in the final) will head from here straight to another event next weekend.”

To boot, there is an element of reciprocity in place, apparently, as semi-finalists Scott McDonald and Laura Neil (lost 8-7 to Matsumura/Tanida in SF) explained in making the six hour drive from south of London to the nickel city.

“David and Manon play a lot of events in southern Ontario, so you want to come and support their event,” said McDonald, a two-time Briar participant who was first drawn to the mixed doubles game on the urging of his home club (St Thomas Curling Club) and their interest in hosting a mixed doubles bonspiel a few years back.

“He’s done a great job putting this on and the ice has been fantastic – and it gives us an opportunity to get points,” continued McDonald. “Northern Ontario is curling country. It’s cool to go somewhere new and see a new club.”

Like so many long-time curlers, McDonald has sensed a certain appeal to the mixed doubles game that absolutely varies from the traditional four-person version. “We got to the final of our first event and found that it was a very different dynamic,” he suggested. “In mixed doubles, there’s nowhere to hide.”

“You can’t take an end off and just run the rocks up and down and blank. You have to be ready to make those precise shots right from shot one.”

And as husband and wife, the team that is currently ranked 34th in the country also benefit from the communication aspect that is critical when you are dealing with only two curlers per team.

“We have to be really honest with each other,” said McDonald. “When you are not throwing at a broom, you’re not getting that feedback to let you know whether you are hitting your spots or not. It can be a little bit humbling at times to admit that you didn’t throw it as well as you thought – but all of the information you are giving is to try and help your partner make their next shot.”

It’s all part of the process of learning more about a version of curling that is still in its relative infancy, whether competitors were coming to Sudbury from near or far.

“One of the reasons that we like coming up here, aside from the points, is that we get good games against good competition – and you learn more in those games,” said Franey, as he and Weldon prepared to hit the road, their early Monday morning flight out of Detroit awaiting them.

“It feels like we are babies in curling compared to some of the players that we faced here.”