The 2025 Inaugural CEGA Geospiel: A Sweeping Success
The first-ever CEGA Geospiel, held at the North Hill Curling Club, was nothing short of a triumph. From enthusiastic curlers to dedicated organizers and generous sponsors, the inaugural event brought the geoscience community together in a fun, dynamic, and highly memorable way. Based on overwhelmingly positive feedback from participants, the Geospiel delivered on all fronts—as a social event, networking opportunity, and community celebration. Planning is already underway to bring it back next year, even bigger and better.
Hosting a bonspiel for the first time posed some logistical challenges. With an uncertain number of players, the organizing committee developed low, medium, and high participation scenarios to guide budgeting and scheduling. Incredibly, the event came within just three players of reaching the high-end target of 96 curlers. A total of 22 teams competed across two brackets—Advanced and Beginner—with trophies and prizes awarded to the top four teams in each.
In the B Bracket, Grand Champions honors went to the Haliburton Hitmen (Aaron Hooper, Eric Atamanik, Amy Foster, and Sean Cold). The Conglomerates (Callum Graham, Coline Thiessen, Jeff Fisher, Robert Panek, Sara Ange Mpakou, and Shaharyar Ahmad) claimed second place.
In the A Bracket, Team LXL Consulting (Daniel Perez, Jason Lentz, Marco Perez, and Matt Ng) emerged as the Grand Champions, while Team Sigma (Alex Saldana, Christ Baldwin, Paul Hausmanis, Stephen Kotkas, and Steven Metzger) took home second place.
Of course, this event wouldn’t have been possible without the support of our fantastic sponsors. A special thank you to our Title Sponsor, Cabra Consulting, and our Ice Sheet Sponsors, Halliburton and Phoenix Technology Services.
We also extend our gratitude to our Gold Sponsors: Altitude Energy Partners, Belloy Petroleum Consulting, Chinook Consulting Services, Tetra Tech / RPS Energy, and XRF Solutions.
Silver Sponsors included Co-point, Pro-Geo Consultants, CoreLab, Caltech, Lonestar, and Reservoir Dogs.
Bronze Sponsors were Cordax, Sigma Explorations, and Kokoro Energy.
The three-day event featured a relaxed, social atmosphere enhanced by beverages from our Title Brewery Sponsor, Balzac Brewing. Friday evening’s banquet, catered by the wonderful staff at the North Hill Curling Club, offered a chance for attendees to unwind and celebrate. Numerous door prizes were handed out, many donated by our sponsors and oil-field vendors including Tectonic Energy, McLeay Geological, RigSat/Petrocraft, ShearFRAC, NOV, and VZ Fox.
A huge thank-you goes to the Geospiel organizing committee for their tireless work: Co-Chair Tracy Theunissen, Jeff Fisher (Scheduling), Shannon Ward (Prizes), Gary Bugden (Trophies), Erin James (Sponsorship), and CEGA office support from Julie Beally.
A special shoutout goes to Team Slippery Schists for their creativity in introducing a one-of-a-kind Tumbler Trophy, awarded to the individual that best embodied the spirit of “on-ice crashing.” This year’s recipient was Gary Bugden.
The enthusiasm from attendees and sponsors alike has set the tone for what we hope will become a long-standing CEGA tradition. We can’t wait to see you at next year’s Geospiel!
Ian Theunissen
2025 Co-Chair, CEGA Geospiel
