CLEAN SWEEP

Ann Podoll brings determination, heart, and focus to the sport of curling

Fargo-Moorhead might be hockey country, but there’s another highly-competitive team sport on the ice.

Tucked away in a North Fargo arena, the FargoMoorhead Curling Club brings together about 150 local athletes. One of those is North Dakota State University sophomore Ann Podoll.

Ann, a quiet 20-year-old nursing student, grew up on the ice. Her parents, Frank and Ruth Podoll of Fargo, have been heavily involved with the FMCC for years. They taught Ann – and her younger brother and sister – the skills, spirit, and strategy of the game and watched them flourish. Over the years, Ann has placed highly at several national competitions, and she has her eye on the Olympics.

“One of her biggest assets is her determination,” Frank said. “Ann has an ‘I’m going to do this’ kind of attitude. That is good for being a skip, or captain, of the team.”

The sport or curling dates back centuries to Scotland, where folks created a game by pushing large river rocks across frozen marshes. Scottish emigrants brought the sport to Canada in the late 1700s and later the United States. Today, 1.5 million people in 35 countries participate in curling.

Curling is played by four-person teams on indoor ice sheets. Players take turns throwing (or precisely sliding) a 42-pound stone toward the opposite end of the ice, known as the house. Play continues until all eight stones per team have been released. The goal is to land the most stones inside the house, or target, while also bumping out opponents’ stones. A round is completed when all 16 stones have been played. Ten rounds make a game.

The sport requires finesse and athleticism, as the thrower must be perfectly aligned to the target, must push off with speed and grace, and must be able to release the stone with just the right turn. After the stone is released, two other teammates use specially-designed brooms to quickly sweep the ice in front of the stone. The sweeping creates friction, melting the ice and creating a layer of water for the stone to glide across.

At the end of the ice, the team’s skip directs where the stone should land. It’s the skip’s role to lead the strategy of the game, something Ann compares to chess.

“You try to be one step ahead of your opponents,” she said. “Sometimes you’re in a jam and have to come up with the best shot of reducing their score or increasing yours.”

That strategy and competitiveness quickly drew Ann to the sport. In fifth grade she joined the youth league and began competing. By eighth grade, she and her friend Christina Lammers, of Fargo, started a junior team with the North Dakota Junior State Competition as their goal. They made it in 2007 and nearly qualified for Nationals. The following year they took second place and made it to Nationals. They followed suit in 2009.

“Ann is really good for our team when it comes to stressful situations,” Lammers said. “She keeps us all calm.”

Ann carried her love of curling to college, where she continues to be coached by her parents and play with Lammers. She serves as the team’s skip. Vanessa Manlove, a junior at Concordia College, plays lead (the first to throw stones.) Casey Hatlevoll, a senior at

Davies High School, plays second (the second player to throw stones). Lammes plays third, and Ann’s sister, Beth, 15, serves as the team alternate.

“Teamwork is so important,” Ann said. “Each person makes a difference and needs to be accountable. If any of us didn’t do our job to the best of our ability, it would hurt the team.”

This year, Ann hopes to lead her team to the Junior Nationals beginning January 28 in Madison, Wisconsin. After that, she looks forward to helping with the 2014 Olympics trials, slated for November 2013 at the Scheels Arena in Fargo. One day she hopes to compete in Olympic trials herself.

“I really want to win, but it’s not everything,” Ann said. “It’s made me lot stronger, knowing I can accomplish whatever I put my mind to. My hard work has paid off.”

For more information about the Fargo-Moorhead Curling Club visit www. fmcurling.org. Learn more about USA Curling at www.curlingrocks.net.