It's Why We Play The Games (part 2)

In this episode of "A Pane In The Glass Podcast" we conclude the topic of "Why We Play The Games" (as we did in the first episode through the lens of wheel chair curling). That first episode left us at the conclusion of the 2026 Canadian Wheel Chair Championship. Now Chris Daw must reflect and make decisions about synthesizing that which was learned to move the yard sticks down the field to prepare for the future, not only for his team, but for himself. As I express in the episode, there's much to take from Chris' words into your situation and sport whatever that may be. As with most episodes a transcript is available which some of you might find useful! 

Transcript

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Welcome to another episode of a pain in the glass podcast. This is your host, Bill Shearhart, Chartered Professional Coach with Coaches of Canada, coming to you from my home in Grand Bend, Ontario, Canada, on the shore of Lake Hieron and on the ancestral land of the Kettle and Stony Point First Nations. As you can see by the show notes, this is the second episode of a two-part series. It's why we play the games. And if you did not hear last week's episode, although it's not a prerequisite exactly, I think you will want to listen to what was talked about. It's from the standpoint of wheelchair curling. But as we said in the episode last week, it could be about any sport. But it was about my friend Chris Daw, who in uh Turin, Italy, in 2006 won the Paralympic gold medal for the first time that wheelchair curling was in the Paralympic Games. And it's an interesting perspective because he has started to play competitively once again. And perhaps you are in that same situation with the sport that you played competitively in another life, so to speak, and what it's like to face the realities of uh trying to elevate your game to that status after that period of time. But the interesting sidebar in the story is that uh he tried to put a team together for the most recent Canadian wheelchair championships, which he did, but he only had three players. And he enlisted as a fourth player his wife Elizabeth, who, well, I'm not going to spill the beans. If you've ever tried to start a sport competitively, and the first time you play is at a national championship, you want to listen to see and hear what she says about it. So, what you're going to hear today are some of the post-Canadian Wheelchair Championship thoughts from the aforementioned Chris Daw. And again, I would like you to listen generically because what he says could apply to any sport. So, with that being said, let's hear what Chris has to say about looking back over those championships and looking ahead to the future. And again, thank you for joining me for this episode of a pain in the glass podcast. The off season silence in wheelchair curling, waiting for the sheet to return. There's a very specific kind of silence that comes when wheelchair curling slips into its off season. It's not the silence of being done, and it's not the silence of stepping away. It's the quiet of the sheet being empty, the ice cleaned, the stones put away, the broomhead stored, and suddenly the entire rhythm of strategy, precision, and delivery removed from your week to week life. For wheelchair curlers, the game doesn't just leave a competitive gap, it leaves a tactical one, a mental one, a social one, even an identity one. Because curling isn't only about delivering stones, it's about reading angles, building ends, adapting dice conditions, and trusting a system that only reveals itself under pressure. When that disappears for a few months, it can feel like more than just rest. It can feel like adrift. At first, the quiet feels like recovery. At the beginning of the off season, there is usually a measure of relief. No travel, no early mornings, no classification logistics or equipment adjustments, no mental load of game planning or wondering what the ice will do in the sixth end when the weight starts to change. The shoulders settle, the mind loosens, the urgency drops. For a while, it almost feels like you've earned the break. Well, because you have. But curling has a way of creeping back into your thoughts in the absence of repetition. And that's where the second phase begins. When doubt slides into the house. It rarely arrives loudly. Because it shows up in small amounts. Am I seeing the ice the same way? Will my release still be consistent when I come back? Have other teams quietly moved ahead while we've been resting? Will I feel like a curler again when I'm back in the chair on the ice? In wheelchair curling, where precision replaces power and timing replaces force, confidence is built through repetition. Without that repetition, your mind starts to simulate what your body isn't currently doing. And simulations are never as convincing as real stones. That's where doubt finds space. Wheelchair curling lives in feel, and feel needs ice. One of the hardest parts of the offseason is that wheelchair curling is not easily, quote, wept alive, off the ice. You can watch tape, you can study strategy, you can think through various scenarios, but the game ultimately lives in delivery, angle, speed, line, and trust in the push. Without ice contact, even for a short stretch, your internal calibration begins to feel slightly unanchored. Not broken, just less certain. And uncertainty is what the mind mistakes for decline. The trap. Confusing pause with loss. This is where athletes often misread themselves. The absence of competition feels like the absence of ability. But in reality, most of what feels like loss in the off-season is just unused precision waiting for reactivation. The slide hasn't disappeared. The reading hasn't vanished. The tactical understanding hasn't gone anywhere. It's just not being tested on an everyday basis. Wheelchair curling is a game of calibration, and calibration always drifts a little when the system is idle. The return to ice always feels honest. When the season starts again and you're back on the ice, there's always that first honest moment. The first draw feels slightly heavier than anticipated. The first takeout is a fraction offline. The timing between thought and release takes a few ends to sink back up. And if you're not careful, your mind will turn that into a story. But it's not a story of decline. It's simply re-entry. Wheelchair curling doesn't forgive rust immediately, but it also doesn't forget skill. The ice gives feedback quickly, and once it does, everything starts to realign. What actually matters in the off-season, the off-season isn't about maintaining perfection, it's about maintaining connection. Connection to the idea of the game, the feel of the delivery, the patterns of strategy, and the version of yourself that exists on the ice. Because when you return, you're not trying to prove that you've never left. You're trying to rebuild rhythm faster than doubt can settle in. And a final thought. But identity doesn't have to be. There will always be stretches where the ice disappears and you're left with your own thoughts about where you stand. But the truth is actually simple. You don't stop being a curler when the ice is empty. You're just waiting for the next stone to bring everything back into focus. When I first put the episode together, it was all about what had happened at Busherville at the Canadian Wheelchair Championships, and I really appreciated the words that Chris shared with me. But then a little bit later, he talked about himself again and the effect of coming back into a sport that uh he realized he loved. And in talking to my friend from time to time, I wasn't so sure as if that passion was there. So these words, again, will help those of you who perhaps um is a teenager, high school or private university, and then life got in the way. But now life has changed for you, and you can get back into a sport competitively. You will be able to understand what Chris had to say about that. So again, well, they're Chris's words and my voice. So let's hear Chris's words. Twenty years away from nationals does something strange to your head. You walk back into the building carrying memories of who you used to be, only to realize pretty quickly that the sport moved on while you were gone. And honestly, maybe it was supposed to. There's this fantasy people have about returning after a long absence. Like experience becomes some kind of superpower, like years away somehow preserve you in sports amber. Reality is much less cinematic. Reality is showing up and realizing you went from hero to zero, and now you have to fight your way back again. Not because you forgot the game, because the game owes you absolutely nothing. That part humbles you and it does so very quickly. The ice doesn't care what I accomplished twenty years ago, and it doesn't care about old titles, old stories, old respect, or old reputations. It only cares about the shot in front of me right now. And there's nowhere to hide from that truth. At first, the realization stings a little. Well, maybe more than just a little. You remember the old version of yourself so clearly that part of you assumes you can just slide back into it. But eventually, reality taps you on the shoulder and says, Nope, start over. So that's what I had to do. Start over. Not completely from scratch, but close enough to bruise the ego. Relearn discipline, relearn timing, relearn patience, relearn how to trust myself under pressure again. And maybe the hardest part? Accepting that experience helps, but it does not exempt you from the rebuild. That was the lesson I needed. For years I probably looked at rebuilding as something connected to failure, something people did after falling apart. Now I see it very differently. Resetting is a part of survival, because if you spend your whole life trying to protect the best version of your past, eventually you stop growing altogether. That's where people get stuck. They become caretakers of old memories instead of builders of new realities. The sport exposes that brutally. Especially after twenty years away. You start noticing how easy it is for people, myself included, to confuse familiarity with progress. To think because something once worked, it should still work now. But bodies change, confidence changes, pressure changes, motivation changes, life changes. You either evolve with it or spend years chasing ghosts. I've done enough of that ghost chasing. What surprised me most about coming back wasn't the competition. It was how much honesty the process demanded from me. Real honesty. Not the poly social media version, the ugly version, the kind where you admit your weaknesses, admit your conditioning isn't where it needs to be. Admit your consistency disappeared. Admit your confidence sometimes walks into the room limping. And somehow, admitting those things became freeing instead of humiliating. Because once the ego gets punched in the mouth a little, clarity starts showing up. You stop performing for your past. You stop defending old accomplishments. You stop expecting credit for history. And you start focusing on the only thing that matters. Who you are willing to become now. That shift changes everything. Coming back after twenty years taught me this. Going from hero to zero is not the end of the story. The dangerous part is deciding to stay there because rebuilding feels, well, let's say, uncomfortable. I'm done protecting old versions of myself. If I have to rebuild piece by piece, shot by shot, season by season, good. That means I'm still moving forward. Reset. Rebuild. Rise again. And maybe that's the real win after all. And moving into the future, win or lose. This will be the way. I don't do this very often, but I want to speak a little bit about the next two episodes because, like these last two, it's a topic. The topic is coaching scholastic athletes, and it will be in two episodes, and you'll understand the reason for that when you hear them. I'm pretty sure that there are many listeners, and thank you to all of you for tuning in. And I know many of you do so on a very regular basis, whether you're on your bike watching your dog or what have you. These next two episodes are about coaching scholastic athletes, as I said. So at the end of the show notes, there is a New York line, and it is underlined that makes it a hyperlink. And when you click on that, your comments come directly to me. I've mentioned this on previous occasions. I have no idea who you are. But I'm going to encourage those of you who do coach scholastic athletes, athletes whose main job is not the sport, it's getting an education. And the balancing act that uh is commensurate with that. To share your experiences, and I encourage you to do so generically without using proper nouns. I think you understand what I mean by that. And I will have no idea who you are. Uh I just get your comment. I think that's going to make the next two episodes uh really come alive when we hear from you. Now I said we because my friend Jim Wade and his granddaughter Sadie, uh, they will be in the second of the two episodes, and they've got some interesting perspectives, especially Sadie. That's all I'm going to say. So, until next time, you know what I'm going to say. Please remember those words of that great North American philosopher Charlie Brown. Don't focus too much on things that make you sad, because there are so many things that can make you happy. Until next time,