Music: {allcanada} MEAD HITS SWEET SPOT SECOND TIME AROUND WITH STOUGHTON TEAM

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REGINA -- It's an old saying that a change is as good as a rest. Jon Mead needed a change five years ago when he broke away from Jeff Stoughton's curling team.

When Stoughton, Mead, second Garry Vandenberghe and lead Steve Gould lost in the final to Brad Gushue in the 2005 Olympic curling trials, Mead was heartbroken.

Preparing for Olympic trials is all-consuming and Stoughton's rink had prepared hard for the right to represent their country at the 2006 Games, while juggling jobs and families at the same time.

Gushue went on to win an Olympic gold medal in Turin, Italy, a few weeks later, while Stoughton's Winnipeg team missed the playoffs with a 6-5 record at the 2006 Tim Hortons Brier.

A burned-out Mead wanted a break not just from the team he'd curled with for eight years, but from the win-at-all costs attitude.

"It killed a part of me competitively," Mead said Friday while preparing for the world curling championships. "When you put that much into it and not only do you not do it and get that close, I just couldn't do it again.

"I really needed to take a break to see if I wanted to play again. There was no part of me that wanted to put my neck on the line to win something that big again because the thought of losing another one of those finals would have been too much to take."

Fast forward through a winter playing for different teams at a few events and then three seasons playing select tournaments on the World Curling Tour with Ontario skip Wayne Middaugh. Mead felt last spring he was ready to play a heavy schedule again and go through the grind of Manitoba playdowns to get back to the Brier.

A few different factors drew Mead like a magnet back onto the Stoughton team. His eight-year-old daughter Sophie was beginning to learn her father was a pretty good curler and Mead, 43, wanted to her to be able to see that.

Mead had stayed in touch with Stoughton over the years and Gould would occasionally ask him "hey, when are you going to come play with us?" Mead couldn't imagine curling for any skip other than Stoughton, so they reunited a year ago.

"I can't remember who called who to be honest," Mead recalled. "Probably one of us was dialling while the other guy was thinking about making the call."

Fast forward again to this year's Tim Hortons Brier in London, Ont. Stoughton, Mead, second Reid Carruthers and Gould had an outstanding tournament, toppling curling giants Kevin Martin of Alberta and Ontario's Glenn Howard en route to a Canadian championship.

Mead and Ontario third Richard Hart tied at 87 per cent for the top shooting percentage at their position during the preliminary round.

Mead shot a team-best 94 per cent in a playoff game against Gushue and then posted a 93-per-cent rating in Stoughton's 8-6 win over Howard in the final. Mead earned the Hec Gervais Award as the top curler in the playoff round.

Mead, a business development manager with Yes! Winnipeg, has hit a curling sweet spot his second time around with Stoughton. He has the confidence and experience to take more ownership of his role on the team.

"I think the difference the first time around was I got carried," Mead explained. "I tried to stay out of the other guys' ways and just not lose it for the guys and give Jeff a chance.

"This time, I felt I was as responsible for the result as anybody and not more so than anybody. I pulled my weight and was really comfortable against teams that have just set the bar as far as the quality of curling in this world with Howard and Martin and some of the other guys.

"I bring a lot more to the table now than I did then. I'm a better player, I'm a better teammate for sure. I'm probably more of a leader, recognizing what the team needs dynamics-wise to perform. Sometimes I'm a rah-rah guy, sometimes I'm a kick-somebody-in-the-ass guy. Before my job was to sweep and throw the rocks.

Stoughton, Mead, Carruthers and Gould make up the Canadian team favoured to take the title at the 2011 Ford World Curling Championship starting Saturday at Regina's Brandt Centre. Olympic silver medallist Thomas Ulsrud of Norway, Sweden's Niklas Edin and Pete Fenson of the U.S. are expected to be Canada's rivals for gold.

Canada opens the tournament Saturday against Switzerland's Christof Schwaller and Denmark's Tommy Stjerne.

Stoughton's team intends to carry the relaxed and confident attitude that brought them so much success at the Brier into the world championship.

"We get uptight and we're not going to be the same team," Mead said. "We kick each other in the ass when somebody gets too uptight out there. We have to do that this week."