Yankton Curling Club

About Yankton Curling Club

Yankton Curling Club: Four Generations on the Ice by the Missouri

Yankton Curling Club brings curling to Yankton, the Missouri River city in southeastern South Dakota. The club was founded in January 2020 by a small group of enthusiasts led by Juliana and Mike Ford, who had earlier helped start the Sioux Falls Curling Club in 2011. Launched just weeks before the pandemic, it nonetheless saw an immediate jump in community interest and has kept growing since.

The club plays on arena ice at the Yankton Ice Rink at the Kiwanis 4-H Activity Center on Whiting Drive, with four sheets marked out for curling. Weekend leagues run through the winter, with Saturday-night games open to spectators, and regular Learn to Curl and open practice sessions bring in newcomers. Adaptive equipment means players with limited mobility and wheelchair users can deliver stones, and the club likes to point out that four generations of one family can play on the same team. Early Learn to Curl events even featured Tim Muller, the 2014 U.S. Olympic men’s curling coach.

Off the ice, the club raises funds for equipment and to keep league fees low through its House Games, an Olympic-style team fundraiser that combines curling ends with axe throwing, crokinole and skeeball at downtown Yankton’s Boat House.