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sportscotland sportscotland is jointly funded through the Lottery Sports Fund and the Exchequer through the Scottish Executive. In March 2004 sportscotland published a new Corporate Plan in support of the Scottish Executive’s strategy for sport, Sport 21 Shaping Scotland’s Future. A copy of the Corporate Plan is enclosed. sportscotland is based in Caledonia House, South Gyle, Edinburgh EH 12 9DQ The Chairman, Julia Bracewell OBE, is a legal consultant and non practising solicitor and barrister. Julia represented Scotland winning Bronze at 1986 and 1990 Commonwealth Games, and has been a member of many sports advisory bodies. The appointment for four years began on the 1st July 05 Our Partnership Manger is Catherine Goodfellow. Catherine attends RCCC Board meetings. In addition to financial support for RCCC programmes sportscotland has provided access to a a number of other services including: - An ICT consultancy company to review our ICT and web based capacity.
- A business consultant to advise on Risk Management processes.
- A financial consultant to advise on accounting procedures, financial governance and to develop a Finance Manual.
- An HR consultant to advise on all HR matters including staff contracts, policies, legislation and recruitment including the preparation of job descriptions, candidate specifications etc.
- A range of training courses, most at no cost to the individual, for Governing Body staff, coaches and volunteers.
- A web based extranet service available to governing Bodies and use of the sportscotland site to advertise vacancies
All of these services have been provided at no cost and are of great benefit to the Royal Club.
The web site is www.sportscotland.co.uk Scottish Institute of Sport The institute, which was set up by sportscotland, is funded through the Lottery Sports Fund to develop Scottish sporting excellence. The Institute is based at: - Airthrey Road, Stirling FK9 5PH
The Chairman is Dougie Donnelly
The Chief Executive is Mike Whittingham
The web site is www.sisport.com Having been designated as a Priority One sport by sportscotland curling receives considerable support from the Institute in preparing our International curlers at both Junior and National levels for European, World and Olympic Championships. The Institute employs our national coach, Derek Brown and assistant coach, Cate Brewster. In addition experienced support staff work in partnership to provide strength and conditioning, physiology, nutrition, psychology, performance lifestyle and elite video analysis. The National Coach and Assistant are members of the RCCC Performance Committee Each of the Institute athletes/teams agrees a curling performance programme with the National coach at which their level of achievement is measured. Teams representing RCCC at European and World Championships must also sign a player’s contract with the RCCC in which amongst other things they accept the authority of the National coach on team matters. The Royal Club has a formal contract ‘The Curling High Performance Agreement’ with the Institute setting out the rights and responsibilities of both parties. A network of 6 Area Institutes supports the National Institute. The lead manager for curling within the Area Institutes is Phil Reid, who is the Manager of the West Institute. Nancy Murdoch our Performance Development Coach overseas the AIS athlete curling programme which involves the National Academy athletes. British Curling Limited As teams participating in Olympic sports represent Great Britain the British Olympic Association required an organisation to be set up to administer the British curling team. British Curling Limited was set up in 2006 to bring together the old British Curling Association and British Wheelchair Curling Association under one umbrella.
The members of the company are RCCC, SWCA, ECA and WCA and the members appoint a Board of Directors to run the company on their behalf.
Current the Board is: | Chairman | Chris Hildrey | | Finance Director | Alan Chalmers | | Director | Hew Chalmers | | Director | Mike Gillespie | | Director | Frank Duffy | | Performance Director | Derek Brown |
National qualification to compete in the Olympics is earned by the number of points gained by their teams at previous World Championships and are based on the team’s final position at these events. Because Scotland is recognised by all three nations in the British Curling as being best placed to score World Championship points the World Curling Federation has been advised that the Scottish teams results should count towards British Olympic qualification. It is worth noting that to qualify for entry to the World Championships a European nation must first finish within the top 8 teams in the preceding European championships.
Details of the selection policy for the British teams for Vancouver will be published shortly on the British Curling web-site.
European Curling Federation
The European Curling Federation was formed in 1975 when it was decided to inaugurate the European Championships. The ECF now has 33 member nations, which are formed into regional groups for administration purposes. These are: - - Northern Europe – Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland
- Eastern Europe – Bulgaria, Russia, Belarus, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Kazakhstan, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Estonia, Croatia, Ukraine
- Central Europe – Germany, Netherlands, Luxembourg, Belgium, Switzerland, France, Italy, Andorra, Austria, Liechtenstein, Israel, Spain, Greece
- United Kingdom – Scotland, England, Wales, Ireland
The Executive of the ECF consists of the President, Vice President, Secretary/Treasurer, a representative from each of the four regions and three members at large from within the constituent nations. Malcolm Richardson, Past President of RCCC is currently the ECF President. (Retires December 2008) Information about the ECF is available on the web site www.ecf-web.org For the UK group it has been the practice for each of the home nations to take turns at filling the ECF Executive post for a two-year period. Anne Stone, Welsh Curling Association presently holds this position. Jeanette Johnston, who is a Director of the RCCC, serves as a member at large on the ECF Executive. European Championships These are held in December each year.
A-GROUP
There are ten teams each in the ‘A’ Men’s and ‘A’ Women’s Division
These ‘A’ teams play a round robin, semi finals, bronze medal games and finals, Gold, silver and bronze ‘A’ medals will be awarded. B-GROUP
The remaining teams are placed in a ‘B’ group Men and ‘B’ group Women
If a B-group consists of more than 10 teams it will be split into group B1 and B2
Group B1 and B2 each play a round robin. After that round robin the first and second ranked teams of B1 and B2 advance to the B-group semi finals/bronze medal games and finals. Gold, silver and bronze ‘B’ medals will be awarded WORLD CURLING CHAMPIONSHIP-CHALLENGE
The gold medal winner of each ‘B’ group plays a three game play-off (one game in A-arena, one game in B-arena and last game, if required, played in the arena decided by the toss of a coin) for the last World Championship place – thus every nation has a chance to qualify for the World Curling Championships.
PROMOTION / RELEGATION OF TEAMS
Rank 9 and 10 of the A-groups will be relegated to the B-group and Rank 1 and 2 of the B-groups will be promoted. Only by qualifying for the World Championships can a nation earn Olympic qualifying points. The programme for future Championships is: - 2007 – Fussen, Germany
2008 – Oernskoeldsvik - Sweden
2009 - Aberdeen, Scotland World Curling Federation The World Curling Federation was formed initially in 1965 when the Royal Club called a meeting in Perth of six countries Canada, USA, Sweden, Switzerland, Norway and Scotland when agreement was reached to form the International Curling Federation. In 1991 this became the World Curling Federation. There are currently 44 member associations with a further 2 having provisional membership. The role of the WCF includes: - To represent curling internationally and facilitate the growth of the sport
- To conduct world curling competitions
- To formulate rules for world and WCF approved competitions
- To promote cooperation and mutual understanding amongst Member Associations
The current WCF President is Les Harrison of Canada, his Vice President is Kate Caithness a former President of the Ladies Branch of the RCCC.
Richard Harding, owner of Greenacres ice rink, is a WCF development officer and has responsibility for Championship venues and television coverage.
The WCF Secretary is Mike Thomson based in their office at: - 74 Tay St, Perth.
Tel 01738 451 630. The web site is www.worldcurling.org The Royal Club has four elected representative members who are: -
Jeanette Johnston, Past President Ladies Branch
Bill Marshall, past Council member
The President of the RCCC, currently Tommy Hinnigan
one vacancy to be filled
These members, who report to the Board, are elected for four years and carry the Royal Club votes (8) at WCF general meetings, which are held annually at the European and World championships. The WCF offer a number of services to member associations including: -
· Discover Curling Manual
· Ice manual ‘Curling Ice Explained’
· Development Assistance Programme
· Loans for curling developments
· Summer camp at Fussen in Germany for ice makers, curling administrators and junior squads
· A mini CD on curling basics The programme of international competitions can be found on the WCF website.
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