Fowler team wives share in the emotional ride

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This article was published 13/03/2012 (5201 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

SASKATOON — It was an up and down week for Brandon’s Rob Fowler and his teammates at the Tim Hortons Brier last week in Saskatoon.

After a slow start, the team, which also includes Allan Lyburn, Richard Daneault and Derek Samagalski, reeled off four straight wins to reach the playoffs, where they lost the 1 vs. 2 Page playoff game and the semifinal before rallying to win the bronze medal on Sunday.

It was an emotional ride for Manitoba fans, but none moreso than the players’ wives. Lyburn’s wife, Lori, and Fowler’s wife, Ericka, were in the upper deck of the Credit Union Centre, living and dying with each shot thrown by their husbands.

“It’s a lot different being the wife of a skip rather than the wife of a second,” Ericka Fowler said. “Watching Rob get in the hack when he goes to throw the final stone, if he’s facing one or hitting for three, it’s a lot more nerve-wracking. I do feel a certain amount of pressure being the skip’s wife — he’s either a hero or a zero — but I can’t control what happens out there. I almost wish I could.”

As nerve-wracking as the Brier was for the wives, it was a nice change of pace for them. The life of the wife of a competitive curler is not an easy one.

Families rarely get to take a winter vacation to warm locations as the players are away at bonspiels almost every weekend. The Fowler team, which is based out of the Brandon Curling Club, spends most of its weekends during the winter competing in World Curling Tour events across Canada as well as Grand Slams, Manitoba Curling Tour events and the occasional local bonspiel.

Most of the time, Lori and Ericka are left in Brandon to look after their children — the Lyburns have a three-year-old daughter, Jordyn, and the Fowlers have a 20-month-old son, Carson — while their husbands are on the road.

“We travel to a couple events, but we usually let him go on his own,” said Lori, who has been married to Allan for seven years. “I get left alone with my daughter Jordyn. We do go to a couple ’spiels that are around the areas in Manitoba and watch, but it’s tough sometimes.”

Things are a little more complicated in the Fowler household.

Both Rob, the general manager of the local Hyundai dealership, and Ericka, a realtor, have very demanding jobs that limit the time they can spend together. Even when Rob isn’t curling, Ericka sometimes finds it hard to see her husband.

“Rob has a hectic work schedule and so do I, so we sometimes meet each other at the door whether he’s curling or not,” Ericka said. “Sometimes we have to rely on his parents or my parents or sisters or aunts to pick up the slack. It’s not as bad as some families probably experience because we do have a lot of family really close by.”

Both wives admit there’s a lot of give and take in their relationships, but they knew what they were getting into when they met their husbands. Both women come from curling families and they both take a lot of pride in seeing their spouses succeed in a sport they love, especially on curling’s biggest stage.

“We’re left on weekends to be single parents when they’re out curling, but I wouldn’t have it any other way,” Lori said. “I like him curling. It’s stressful, but it’s good. … My dream is his dream. I want him to do well in curling and that’s my dream.”

“It hasn’t been easy, but you never know when the last bonspiel is going to come and you never want to look back and say we held back Rob from trying to pursue his dreams of getting to an Olympics or getting to a Brier or being one of the top teams out there,” Ericka added. “Definitely, the rewards we have because of curling outweigh the negatives. For him to be on a Top 10 team in the world for the last five, six, seven, eight years, it definitely outweighs the bad stuff.”

» cjaster@brandonsun.com