Martin rink heads to Vancouver on positive note

Beat rival Howard to win BDO Canadian Open

Last Updated: Sunday, January 24, 2010 | 6:34 PM ET

By Malcolm Kelly, CBC Sports

Kevin Martin and his Alberta foursome are off to the blazing media heat of the Vancouver Olympics with a needed win under their belts.

The Canadian men's representative for the 2010 Games beat archrival Team Howard 6-4 on Sunday afternoon at the BDO Classic Canadian Open in Winnipeg — the last competitive match the foursome will play before leaving for the West Coast.

Martin left Glenn Howard having to put an in-turn draw into the four-foot as shot stone to stay alive in the eighth and final end, but the Ontario-based skip came up just short.

With the victory, the Alberta rink, also including third John Morris, second Marc Kennedy and lead Ben Hebert, won $25,000.

Team Howard, with third Richard Hart, second Brent Laing and lead Craig Savill, earned $17,500.

After qualifying for the Olympics by beating Howard in the trials a month ago, Martin's rink had played poorly at the last Grand Slam event and was looking to rebound.

"It's nice we played a solid game, against real tough competition," Martin told Scott Russell of CBC Sports. "It bodes well going forward and now we have a couple of weeks to get ready."

This was Martin's 14th Grand Slam title, but he hadn't won since 2007.

"We were stuck on 13 for a while," he said. "It's so hard to win one of these things, so 14 means a lot."

Quick lead

Martin was off early, picking up two with the hammer in the first end, taking advantage of a Howard error.

With two of Martin's yellows in the ice, Howard tried for a double takeout, but only picked up the front one, leaving his rival with an easy hit and stick for the pair.

A rocky second end saw both teams commit errors, but in the end a nice final rock by Martin eliminated two of Howard's and forced the Ontario skip to take one, cutting the lead to 2-1.

That went to 4-1 in the third when Martin left Howard looking at curling's version of the famous bowling 7-10 split, with one on each side of the 12-foot circle.

Howard did all he could by taking out the one on the left, but Martin easily eliminated to score two.

After settling for one with the hammer in the fifth end to make it 4-2, Howard left Martin with a chance for three after a sixth that was spent battling around the four foot.

But Martin couldn't get the big score, though he did nudge in for one for 5-2 heading to the seventh, where Howard took advantage of an open hit for two to make it 5-4 coming home, hammer to the Alberta rink.