Mac lumberjacks saw, chop way to top

BY IAN HOWARTH

The competitors at the 47th annual Woodsman event on the Macdonald Campus of McGill University battled extreme cold and muscle fatigue with the Macdonald No. 1 men’s team repeating as champions.

Twenty-four teams representing 10 academic institutions took part in the event, which included events ranging from the axe throw and pole climbing to the more traditional sawing and chopping categories. Men and women from Quebec, Ontario and the U.S. — more than 150 competitors in all —braved the cold in the one-day competition, the third of four Woodsman events held for the 2006-’07 academic year. The Macdonald No. 1 men’s team outpointed Sir Sanford Fleming College and the Nova Scotia Agricultural College, who finished second and third respectively. The women’s number one team finished third behind NSAC and Sir Sanford Fleming.

Coach John Watson, whose day job as forest operations manager at the Morgan Arboretum in Ste. Anne de Bellevue eminently qualifies him as Macdonald’s Woodsman coach, a position he has held for the last 30 years. “When we first started we had only six teams but the event has grown exponentially since.”

In fact, not including Saturday’s men’s team victory, Watson has coached the men and women Woodsmen to 125 championships, making them the most successful team at McGill. Both the men and women are in good position to win the overall championship at the final event to be held Feb. 10 in Truro, the home of the Nova Scotia Agricultural College.

“This competition puts us in good shape to win the overall championship. The women won their first two competitions and the men are way ahead for overall points,” Watson said.

Winners receive the Stihl Cup and bragging rights for next year.

Beaconsfield’s Helen Garland, in her third year of wildlife biology at McGill, was in her second Woodsman competition, specializing in the chain saw and quarter split events. “I wasn’t too happy with my results,” she said, warming up in the Centennial Building cafeteria between events. “I wasn’t happy with our time in the quarter split (where the wood has to be split in four showing a portion of a dot placed at the top) and in the chain saw, I failed to make my bottom cut meet the top one. But I can’t blame the cold. It didn’t bother me that much.” Garland’s teammate in the quarter spilt, Lise Cobitz, a third-year human nutrition student, is also a veteran with 11 competitions under her belt. “Our times could have been better, but the cold didn’t bother me either,” said Cobitz, whose other event is the pole climb.

Participants Jean Smith and Gina Van Wieren from Sir Sanford Fleming College in Ontario, both in their first year of competition, enjoyed the warmth of Macdonald’s hospitality and showed their true grit braving Montreal’s cold climate. “Except for the fact that I spilt my water in the water boiling event, I thought we did pretty well,” said Smith of her school’s second place finish in both the women and men’s categories.

Kevin Boekhoff, a third-year farm management student and captain of the Macdonald men’s number two team, said the team has been training hard with four-a-week, two-hour practices that start at 6 a.m. “We’re in pretty good shape and I’d be happy with a second or third,” understating his team’s potential with typical lumberjack humility.

Others, like spare Matt Dandy, take their training seriously. “I haven’t had a beer in 16 days,” said Dandy, who hails from Vankleek Hill, Ont. “That may end at tonight’s banquet.” woodsman honours