Day one of the Northern Ontario Curling Tour's Asham Slam at the Tarentorus Curling Club is complete.
Thirty teams are currently battling for a share of the $13,000 in available prize money in the newly formed Tour. The Asham Slam is the second stop in the six-event Tour.
The 30 teams are grouped into five divisions with six teams each. Each division winner along with three wild card teams will advance into Sunday's playoff round.
Teams on the NOCT are battling to accumulate enough points to gain a spot into the 16-team Tour championship in April. Points are awarded based on earnings and round robin victories.
With a diverse field of men, women, mixed, juniors and seniors all competing against each other, a gender scale has been developed to even out the points amongst all competitive teams.
The men will remain even while senior men will multiply their points by 1.2, junior men by 1.4, ladies, senior ladies and mixed by 1.7 and the junior ladies by 1.8.
A round robin victory credits a team with 100 points while 1,000 points is gained for every $1,000 earned.
Joining the 20 men's teams in the Asham Slam field are mixed teams skipped by Matt Seabrook, Jeff Brown and Jim Lisk. Women's teams include Elaine Uhryn, Dawn Schwar, Nancy Houle, Brenda Johnston and Jan Pula. Junior teams are skipped by Brad Jacobs and Sandy MacEwan.
Sault Ste. Marie teams in the field are skipped by Kevin Rutledge, Seabrook, Larry Pallot, Al Harnden, Jacobs, Uhryn, Ken Graham, Houle, Al Belec, Greg McLellan and Les Fleming.
The eventual Asham Slam champion will win $4,000 while the runner-up nets $2,000. The semi-final losers collect $1,500 each while the quarterfinals losers earn $1,000 each.
Action will continue on Saturday with draw seven beginning at 8 a.m. Draws will be held every two hours, except for a two hour break beginning at 2 p.m., until the final round robin draw at 10 p.m.
Quarterfinal action is scheduled for Sunday at 9 a.m., the semi-finals at 12:30 p.m. and the final at 4 p.m.
In the Labatt Classic, the first stop on the Tour in North Bay in October, Sudbury's Mike Jakubo defeated Harnden in the championship game.
The NOCT was formed by Sudbury's Tim Phillips, North Bay's Mark Brown and Englehart's Stephen Chenier.
To visit the NOCT website, click here.
*** The following are the scores from day one action on Friday:
DRAW 1 (9 a.m.):
Mike Jakubo - 8 Larry Pallot - 1
Sandy MacEwan - 2 Mike Assad - 6
Kevin Rutledge - 7 Matt Seabrook - 5
Al Harnden - 5 Ken Graham - 10
Brad Jacobs - 3 Mark Brown - 1
Chris Johnson - 3 Elaine Uhryn - 8
DRAW 2 (11 a.m.):
Rob Gordon - 4 Greg McLellan - 7
Jeff Brown - 4 Al Gemmell - 8
Dawn Schwar - 5 Nancy Houle - 7
Tim Phillips - 4 John Salo - 6
Al Belec - 7 Daryl Rowlandson - 5
Brenda Johnston - 6 Les Fleming - 7
DRAW 3 (1 p.m.):
John McClelland - 8 Jeff Currie - 1
Jordan Chandler - 6 Glen Legassie - 4
Jim Lisk - 7 Jan Pula - 5
Jakubo - 9 Rutledge - 2
MacEwan - 4 Seabrook - 7
Assad - 4 Pallot - 6
DRAW 4 (5 p.m.):
Harnden - 6 Uhryn - 7
Jacobs - 5 Johnson - 6
M. Brown - 3 Graham - 5
Gordon - 4 Houle - 2
J. Brown - 0 Schwar - 8
Gemmell - 2 McLellan - 6
DRAW 5 (7 p.m.):
Phillips - 7 Fleming - 2
Belec - 8 Johnston - 4
Rowlandson - 2 Salo - 4
McClelland - 8 Pula - 1
Chandler - 8 Lisk - 6
Legassie - 8 Currie - 6
DRAW 6 (9 p.m.):
Assad - 5 Rutledge - 1
Jakubo - 9 Seabrook - 2
MacEwan - 5 Pallot - 4
Brown - 7 Uhryn - 2
Harnden - 4 Johnson - 3
Jacobs - 6 Graham - 4