The new debate

[kickingfrog]

Forget all of our old debates: Tiller v console; Walleye v pickerel; bait cast v spin; canoe v kayak

 

It is now about who has the longer skating rink. Nothin' like some men arguing about who's is bigger.

 

 

 

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/sto...l_gam_mostemail

 

 

 

PATRICK WHITE

 

From Thursday's Globe and Mail

 

January 8, 2009 at 4:35 AM EST

 

WINNIPEG — Work with what you got, they say. And in Winnipeg, they "got" ice. Acres of it.

 

That's why, for the second year in a row, Winnipeg is breaking Guinness records and jabbing its mittened thumb in Ottawa's eye by scraping out the world's longest skating trail.

 

Just call it Ice War II.

 

"Nobody can beat us," says Paul Jordan, the Winnipeg River Trail's chief cheerleader and organizer. "We'll keep pushing this thing through to Norway House and Portage la Prairie if we have to."

 

The River Trail has become more than a skating surface; it's an act of national defiance.

 

Last year, it ran 8.54 kilometres along the Assiniboine and Red rivers, eclipsing Ottawa's famed Rideau Canal and earning the city a Guinness record for the world's longest naturally frozen skating trail.

 

This year, mother nature threw a wrench in plans to make the trail even longer, littering the Red River with uneven frazil ice. But in Mr. Jordan's zeal to thump Ottawa again, he had workers push the surface in the opposite direction, up the Assiniboine.

 

When the entire trail opens this month, Mr. Jordan expects it to measure 9.32 kilometres, smashing last year's record and putting Rideau Canal's paltry 7.8 kilometres to shame.

 

"The Rideau people get all fussed up about it," says Mr. Jordan, chief operating officer of the Forks, a community development organization. "They are now claiming they are the widest. Well, they can be wide. I'd rather be long."

 

The Ice War became so heated last year that it sparked a rare bit of intra-party heckling in the House of Commons. When Winnipeg North Centre MP Judy Wasylycia-Leis stood to tout the River Trail's length, Ottawa Centre MP - and fellow NDPer - Paul Dewar couldn't help but pipe up.

 

"I just had to take issue with my colleague when she said that Winnipeg has the longest and best skating surface in the world," says Mr. Dewar, who visited the River Trail with skates around Christmas only to find it closed. "From my reports it's more of a cow path than a skating rink."

 

Compared with the Rideau Canal - with its floodlights, warm-up shacks and huts selling Beaver Tail pastries - the River Trail is relatively sparse. The Winnipeg surface narrows to the width of a car in spots and is hand-shovelled by eight university students. Last year, several weary skaters had to flag down cabs after becoming worn out by the trail's length. "They hopped into taxis with their skates still on," says Mr. Jordan.

 

But those are just signs that the trail is true to its hardy Manitoba roots, say locals. "[Ottawans] can keep their Beaver Tails," says Jim Maloway, another local MP, standing along an Assiniboine riverbank in -31 wind chill. "They'd all be frozen Popsicles out here this time of year."

 

Despite such fighting words, some Ottawans won't deign to speak of a rivalry. "We don't feel there is a competition," says Alain Nantel, the National Capital Commission official responsible for the Rideau Canal Skateway, who says he has no plans to challenge Winnipeg by dynamiting the locks that hem in the Rideau skating surface.

 

Despite claims to conciliation, Mr. Nantel is quick to point out that the Rideau is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and holds the Guinness record for the world's largest skating rink by surface area.

 

In this most Canadian of battles, perhaps a most Canadian sentiment is the solution.

 

"In the good spirit of Canadian compromise, maybe they can have the longest and we can have the largest," says Mr. Dewar. "If that doesn't work, we need a skate-off. An independent third party can skate our canal and then attempt to skate on the Winnipeg path. It's not just quantity but quality that matters in good ice."

 

He should watch his tongue, warns Mr. Maloway. "The only thing separating me from Paul is a very small aisle."