Bill Lim has the mind of a computer technician, his full-time occupation when he's not figuring out the fine art of making a 20-kilogram stone curl on ice.
Troubleshooting hard drives is an everyday occurrence for Lim and his work is never far at hand. However, the opportunity to win the Kelly Cup men's curling bonspiel comes but once a year, and the 60-year-old skip had an action plan in place long before he stepped onto the ice last weekend at the Prince George Golf and Curling Club.
"For the first time in six months I took five days off in a row, I must have been ready for this," said Lim. "Usually I work on and off through it, but this year I decided to take the time off and chill and I had no worries about work for five days."
The strategy worked to perfection for Lim and his crew -- third Don Martin, second Mike Walch and lead Chad St. Peter -- who survived a late challenge from Scott Horvath to win the 87th annual Kelly Cup championship 4-3 in Sunday's final.
"It feels just as good the second time around as it did the first time -- to see your name go back on that trophy is big," said Lim, a native of Victoria who also won in 2004.
"From the look on the faces of my team, Don Martin has been curling for years in Prince George and had never won it. Mike started curling with me in 1983 and 30 years after his first Kelly he finally gets a Kelly Cup ring. It was pretty emotional, he was almost in tears."
Lim and company went 8-1 in the tournament. They dispatched defending champion Bill Fisher in the opening Kelly Cup round, then knocked off Dave Johnston to qualify for the final.
Lim and Horvath met three times in the tournament. Lim lost 4-3 to Horvath in the second round of the A-draw, and topped Horvath by the same score in the B-semifinal.
Horvath, with Evan Achtemichuk at third, Norm Carne at second and Al Wiensczyk at lead, defeated the ageless Wilf Peckham and A-event champion Chris Calder in their Kelly Cup round games. Horvath was a Kelly Cup finalist in 2008, losing to Scott Sherba.
"We really wanted to win this one because it's our last one curling with Norm, who's moving to Victoria," said Achtemichuk. "It would have been great to go out on a high note like that but Bill was pretty tough in the end, he didn't miss a single shot. He's a full deserving winner and if we had to lose we couldn't have picked a better teams because they're just great guys all around."
Sherba ended up winning the D-event on the weekend while Owen Matheson claimed the C-event final.
