U.S. curlers learned at their parents' knees

Cassie Johnson feels at home on the ice.

And with good reason.

The 24-year-old skip and leader of the U.S. women's Olympic curling team and her sister Jamie, 25, the vice-skip, grew up at the Bemidji (Minn.) Curling Club, able to hold brooms in their hands almost from the moment they could walk.

While their parents, Tim and Liz, winners of multiple state and national curling titles, spent hours in the arena practicing their skills or battling it out in league games, the two Johnson girls passed the time taking turns sitting on the 42-pound granite playing pieces and sliding across the ice.

When Cassie turned 5, she and Jamie, then 6, graduated to throwing "little rocks" (a 17-pound plastic model designed for junior curlers) instead of riding on them.

And that was that.

"Curling was a huge family sport -- our lives totally revolved around it," Cassie Johnson says.

The sport is in Cassie Johnson's heart and soul as well as her genes. She was born to be a skip, bred to be a champion and destined to be an Olympian. Her best coaches, stiffest competition and most supportive fan club always have been the folks seated with her at the family's dinner table.

"Many, many times we'll create a Johnson family event," says Tim, 52, a press operator who makes panels of a plywood substitute for the Ainsworth Corp. "On Sundays ... we'll meet at the curling club, make up games and have lunch."

Liz, 54, who works in the offices of Peterson Sheet Metal, says, "It's hard to determine who's the most competitive curler in the family."

But it's the Johnson sisters who have thrived on the highest stages.

At the February 2005 Olympic team trials, Cassie threw a perfect draw shot with the final stone in the 11th end to give her team a dramatic 5-4 victory against the Debbie McCormick rink to clinch the Olympic berth. Cassie says it's the greatest shot of her life.

The Johnson sisters seem to collect big moments. Fourth-generation curlers on their father's side, Cassie and Jamie won the silver medal in the 2005 World Championships and the gold medal in the 2002 Junior World Championships -- the first U.S. junior girls team to do so.

"After we won the Olympic trials and we finished second at Worlds (in March 2005), our lives changed," Jamie says. "People started saying, 'Wow, this team is really good.' Before that there were a lot of people who thought we were too young and too inexperienced to be any kind of threat."

Having had such a strong familial influence throughout her curling career, it's not surprising that when Cassie Johnson filled in the remaining two spots of her team, she focused on creating a second family.

"Friendship is very important to her," her mother says. She selected Maureen Brunt, 23, of Portage, Wis., in the spring of 2001 because, Cassie says, she has a "great personality." She selected Jessica Schultz, 21, of Anchorage in the spring of 2004 because, Cassie says, "she's really positive."

The Johnson sisters share an apartment in Bemidji. Brunt, Schultz and 19-year-old alternate Courtney George of Duluth, Minn., who all relocated to train as a team for the Olympics, live in a complex across the street.

"We like to think of ourselves as equals out there," Cassie Johnson says. "Our philosophy is simple -- be patient on the ice and have fun."

By hanging out at the Bemidji Curling Club from the time they were toddlers, the Johnson sisters rubbed elbows and ice with top national and international players who competed there.

Tim, who has lived in Bemidji for most of his life, joined the curling club in 1967 when he was 14. Liz, born and raised in Bemidji, didn't start curling until she was 25, after she started dating Tim.

Liz is the parent who has been most actively involved in teaching and coaching their daughters.

When they first took up the sport, Liz enrolled them in a Sunday evening program at the club. When Cassie was in sixth grade, Liz launched an after-school junior program on Monday afternoons.

A former grade-school teacher, Liz coached their junior team for years.

Neither Tim nor Liz takes any credit for their daughters' feats.

"They've astounded me over the years," Tim says. "We never pushed -- we introduced -- and they jumped in with both feet."

What is Cassie's greatest strength? "Her mind," her mother says. "She sees all of the angles. She understands strategy."

What is Jamie's greatest strength? "She's a really good sweep," her mother says. "She's good at draws and takeouts. I always say if you give Jamie a second shot, she'll make it."

Of course, the rocks don't stop there.

This season, in between competing in the USA, Canada and Europe in preparation for the Torino Olympics, Cassie also is playing in a Tuesday night mixed-team league at the Bemidji Curling Club. The skip of her team? Len Bergstrom, her paternal step-grandfather.

During the 2003-04 and 2004-05 curling seasons, Cassie, as skip, played in a mixed-team league at the club with her grandmother, Marlene Bergstrom, and two of Marlene's sisters-in-law.

"None of us had curled in 25 years, but Cassie was so gracious about playing with us," Marlene says. "We weren't much of a team, and she had to save the day many times. When we won first prize, people said, 'How did you get that skip?' And I said, 'It's not what you know, it's who you know.'"

Who's the best curler?

"It depends who you ask," Tim says. Cassie says: "I honestly don't know. If Jamie and I played 10 games, she'd win five and I'd win five."

Grandma Marlene refuses to skate around the question.

"It's not fair to say who's the best," she protests. Then, she quickly blurts out with a laugh, "By far, it's me!"

*Jamie Johnson sounds off on trash talking and curling misconceptions at olympics.usatoday.com

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