Evolution Of The Practice Barn
January 11/2000
After years of not having any practices during the winter months, we realized that, if we wanted to get better results in our competitions, we had to practice during the winter. In November of 1996 we started with a weekly practice in a horse barn. At our first competition in Ancaster in 1997 we finished with a first place and we were happy to see that our training was starting to pay off. The following December we renovated an old chicken barn. We installed a gantry (weight tower) and wooden ladders on the floor and had our first practice in January of 1998. With the training barn set up especially for tug-of-war we improved so much that we finished first in all weight classes that year.
In the fall of 1999 we were looking at ways to improve the barn with the construction of a taller gantry, but because of the length (shortness) of the barn we were not able to install a bigger gantry. The only way to improve our winter training was to move to a different location. In November of 1999 we started with the renovation of an unused pig barn across from our summer training grounds. On January 10th, after six weeks of "hard" work and the installation of a 90 foot ladder, a dirt track and two gantries, we had our first practice in our new barn.
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