The wait is over for Marc Kennedy. The Roar of the Rings Olympic Trials starts next Saturday at the Canadian Tire Centre in Ottawa for the third on the Kevin Koe rink. “It sure sneaks up on you fast when you’re busy and enjoying what you’re doing,” said Kennedy, prior to Thursday’s practice at the Saville Community Sports Centre. “It’s here so I think we can feel comfortable that we’ve put in all the time and effort that we can. I don’t think we have any regrets when it comes to our preparation and now we just go out and play the best we can and hope to get a few breaks and see what happens.” The best of the best are competing at the Canadian qualifier for the 2018 Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea. The contenders are 2017 Brier and world champion Brad Gushue of St. John’s, N.L., 2014 Olympic gold medallist Brad Jacobs of Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., Brendan Bottcher of Edmonton, Reid Carruthers of Winnipeg, John Epping of Toronto, Steve Laycock of Saskatoon, Mike McEwen of Winnipeg, John Morris of Vernon and Team Koe, with second Brent Laing, lead Ben Hebert, alternate Scott Pfeifer of St. Albert and coach John Dunn. “It’s crazy tough,” said Kennedy, an Olympic gold medallist in 2010 as the second on the Kevin Martin rink with Morris and Hebert. “We won back in 2009 and there was only three teams that really had a chance to win that Roar of the Rings if they were playing well. Now, you look at the field and out of these nine teams all nine have pretty good pedigree and honestly almost all nine have a chance to win this event and that just goes to show the depth of curling in Canada. "We feel lucky to be a part of it but it’s going to be a crazy hard thing to win. You’re going to need to play great. We’re also going to need a few breaks and a few misses here and there but I’m excited to see how it all plays out.” The Olympic Trials are considered tougher than the Brier. “Not only the quality of teams are better but this only comes along once every four years,” said Kennedy, who curled in his eighth Brier and the third with the Koe rink in 2017, as the Team Canada entry as the 2016 Brier and world champions lost the final 7-6 to Jacobs at the Mile One Centre in St. John’s. “With the Brier if you don’t win it you get another chance next year, it comes back just like that in 12 months, but with this one it might be the last opportunity for a lot of us and that adds a whole another level of pressure and you start to see that unfold as the week goes on. Some guys thrive under that pressure and some can’t handle it so we’ll see who is going to be able to handle it during the stressful moments." On the World Curling Tour, Team Koe is third among the money leaders at $56,800 as the No. 2 Canadian rink and is fifth in the order of merit standings as the third highest-ranked Canadian foursome. “We’ve had a way more consistent season than we did last year. Maybe not as many wins as we would like but we did win Penticton (a WCT event earlier this month) and we qualified in a couple of Slams,” said Kennedy of the quarter-finalists at the Boost National last week in Sault Ste. Marie. “Our level of play has definitely improved. When you talk about peaking we’ve done a good job of putting ourselves in a position to peak and hopefully we can go to Ottawa and get off to a good start and play the way we know we can,” Kennedy added. “We’ve had moments this year where all four of us have played really well and when that happens we’re a really tough team to beat so we just have to hope all four of us are dialed in for that week and can put together some good games.” At times last season Team Koe went through the motions with a berth at the Roar of the Ringers already secured as the winner of the Home Hardware Canada Cup in December of 2015 in Grande Prairie. “One of the reasons for our struggles last year is that you know you’re in the Trials but you’re a year away. You kind of want to get here now and you’re trying to do everything all at once to get prepared but now that you get closer to that finish line you can almost feel this clam relaxing feeling come over you knowing that you’ve been through the ups and downs the last three years and now you can go out and play. It's finally here and you don’t have to wait longer and that gives you almost a peace of mind,” said Kennedy, a three-time Brier winner and two-time world champion. Team Koe was formed in the spring of 2014 with the end goal of representing Canada at the Olympics and the Roar of the Rings will determine how next season will unfold. “I know in (2013 curling with Martin, third David Nedohin and Hebert) in Winnipeg there was a lot of talk about what was going to happen after the Trials. There was a lot of focus on who’s going to play with who, what are we going to do if we lose and it became a little bit of a distraction so this time around after learning from our previous experience it was let’s not even talk about that until it’s done. Let’s not go there, let’s just worry about what’s right in front of us and that’s the Olympic Trials because if you win the Trials it changes everything. If you go to the Olympics it changes the next four years of your life so let’s not go down that road and we’ll worry about that once the Trials are finished,” said Kennedy, a St. Albert Curling Club wall of fame inductee along with Pfeifer in 2011. Pfeifer is a multiple Brier and world champion and is alternate for the Koe rink for the third year in a row.
