Sociable Cider Werks, 1500 Fillmore St. NE, held its annual bonspiel, a curling tournament, on February 21 and 22. The event kicked off with a smoosh race, pictured below, sponsored by Northstar Running Club. It raised money for YFDS, a North Minneapolis nonprofit helping students get to college and learn healthy habits. The evening concluded with music in the taproom as teams competed in the curling competition out front, pictured above. (Davis Steen)
Bonspiels, a type of curling tournament, were historically held outdoors on a freshwater loch in Scotland. On February 21 and 22, while there was no loch and the water may not have been fresh, Sociable Cider Werks, 1500 Fillmore St. NE, held its own version of this competition.
This year, the event featured more than just curling. Runners had a chance to take some old shoes, screw them onto a board and help students get to college.
Sociable Cider Werks encouraged outdoor activity in the cold winter months with its bonspiel event. The smoosh race required competitors to screw their shoes into to a wooden two-by-four. Rivals painted their planks to show their team pride. (Davis Steen)
Smooshing for a cause
Northstar Running started the weekend with a smoosh race. Not much can be found online of where the term “smoosh” comes from, but the competition has been going for nearly a decade.
“I think it’s our ninth year doing (a smoosh race),” Ann Davenport said. Davenport is the president of Northstar Running Club, the group heading the event, and was competing in the smoosh race while dressed as a zebra. “We do it as a fundraiser.”
The smoosh race features an eight-foot two-by-four with four pairs of shoes drilled into it. “You put together a four-person team, and you race down around and come back,” Davenport said. Each competitor brought their own footwear, most of which were filled with holes and worn down.
“These aren’t your actual shoes right here because they’re pretty much ruined,” she said. “That’s the beauty of being a running club, is that we have access to a lot of old shoes.”
Melvin Anderson, the president and founder of YFDS, talks with smoosh racers about the nonprofit’s mission while students currently in the program stand by his side. (Davis Steen)
The smoosh race preceded the bonspiel and was for the benefit of a group called Youth & Families Determined to Succeed (YFDS). Melvin Anderson, YFDS’ founder and president, was on hand to talk about the program, as well as to have four of the organization’s student athletes compete.
“We’re a youth development organization that helps kids be great by going to college and help them with food or fitness and nutrition,” Anderson said. “It’s more about, ‘How do we connect the dots to college to success?’ Not just hope and pray.”
Anderson was a wide receiver for the University of Minnesota football team and eventually made it to the NFL with the Pittsburgh Steelers. He credits his time at the University with getting him to where he is today.
“Generational trajectory changed because of one little scholarship,” Anderson said, summing up the goal of YFDS and giving a heartfelt backing to an otherwise goofy event.
A curler swept the ice, a technique used to make a stone travel farther, straighter, or with a curl. (Davis Steen)
Sweep, sweep, curl
The curling portion of the day was scheduled for noon. The somewhat warmer weather of the past week, along with the sun fully shining on the ice all day, meant the competition had to be pushed back to 4 p.m.
“This is our annual, once-a-year event,” Dan Suerth said. Suerth is the commissioner of the Sociable Cider Werks curling league and was running the event at the bonspiel weekend.
The cidery boasted a taproom-exclusive prize package and the “Crowler Cup,” a trophy made of aluminum cans stacked on top of each other, to the winner. The winning team would play on both Saturday and Sunday, giving them more of a chance to enjoy the weekend’s offerings.
A team discusses how to much force is needed to get the stone from one end of the ice to the other. (Davis Steen)
“The annual event we put on has curling, obviously, music, food trucks,” Suerth said while standing in the warming house at the west end of the ice. Each team would play for around 40 minutes and Suerth would alert teams to the time left in the game.
The hole-pocked slushy ice at Sociable is far removed from the luxury indoor ice of the recently completed Winter Olympics, but that didn’t stop the teams from competing and getting out in the long Minnesota winter.
“We normally play on an indoor rink,” a member of one team said while preparing in the warming house. “We’re just here to have fun.”
Team Short & Curlers won the event, according to an Instagram post from Sociable Cider Werks.