Curling

Curling is a team sport played on ice. The object of the game is for two teams of four players to slide 42-pound granite rocks down a sheet of ice 140 feet long by 15 feet wide. The rocks are delivered toward the center of a 12-foot diameter target similar to an archery target. The targets are painted into the ice at both ends of the sheet of ice, so the game is played back and forth, usually eight times. Each team positions rocks closest to the center of the targets in an attempt to score more than their opponent.

The ice surface in curling is not flat, but covered in pebbles. This pebbling is done to reduce friction, which allows the granite stones to slide along the ice a farther distance before stopping. The reduction in friction is caused by less of the actual rock hitting the ice. Instead of the whole bottom of the stone coming in contact with the ice, only a part of the rock comes in contact with the ice, therefore reducing surface area and decreasing friction.

The distance that the rock will travel, and where it will come to a stop also depends on how hard the rock is delivered. The speed of the delivery depends on how hard a player pushes out of the hack. A hack is a piece of rubber at the end of the sheet of ice that a player pushes out of in order to throw a stone down the ice. The faster a player pushes out of the hack the greater that the momentum of the rock will be, and therefore the rock will travel farther. Subsequently, the slower that a player pushes out of the hack the less momentum the rock will have, and the rock will not travel as far. It is important for a curler to know with what force to push out of the hack so that they will be able to hit the target at the opposite end of the ice.

The line in which you deliver a stone is also crucial to where the rock is to end up. The game is called curling because the rocks curl as they continue down the ice. The curl is due to the rotation that is put on the rock. A clockwise rotation of the rock causes the rock to move to the right, while a counter clockwise rotation will cause the rock to move to the left. The curling action of the rock is caused by the force of the rock. The rotation on the handle causes the rock to want to move in either direction. A proper turn placed on the rock is also very important. If this is not achieved the rock will likely end up somewhere completely different from where it was intended to go.

Another factor that effects where a rock will end up is how and when the rock is swept. Sweeping is done with a broom designed for curling. The sweeping action very slightly melts the surface of the ice creating a thin water film, which lowers the friction between stone and ice. This has two effects: the stone does not slow down as quickly and runs further before it stops and the curved path becomes straighter. Therefore the place where the stone stops and its direction can be changed while it is running without touching it. The sweeping of a rock can greatly change the outcome of a rock for these reasons. This is why sweeping is such an important part of the game of curling. The sweeping is done by the players on the team who aren’t throwing a rock at a given time.

Another part of the game of curling is hitting other rocks out of the house. When one rock hits another, very little energy is lost. This is because there is not a large amount of friction between the bottom of the rock and the surface of the ice. As the rocks are circles, where the rock is hit will have an effect on where the stationary stone will go, and where the "shooter" stone will go. If the "shooter" stone hits the stationary stone right in the middle, the shooter stone will not move anywhere, hitting the stationary stone straight back. However if the shooter stone hits the stationary stone anywhere off centre, the shooter stone will roll sideways, and the stationary stone will be hit back on an angle. The greater distance off centre that the rocks make contact with one another, the greater the amount of roll on the shooter stone will be, and the greater the angle back on the stationary stone will be.

AND THE HISTORY…

The game itself is more than 500 years old and its' true origin is hidden in the mist of time, but it was in Scotland the game evolved during the centuries and also where the mother club of curling, The Royal Caledonian Curling Club was formed in 1838. The game has of course evolved through the years and the latest change on how the game is played was introduced in 1990 when the free guard zone rule was introduced.

This "first curler" must have been intrigued by the way the rock moved and by the grumbling sound it made as it twisted and turned. Other people in the not so distant past have heard this same sound and have applied it as a nickname for the game of curling ... it is often referred to as "the roaring game".

Scots and continental Europeans have engaged in many a lively dispute as to the true origin of curling. Both claim to be founders. Did Scots invent the game, or was it imported by Flemish sportsmen who emigrated to Scotland during the reign of James VI (James I of England)? Did Europeans engage in some early form of curling, and did Scots merely adopt and enhance it? The evidence, based on works of art, contemporary writings, and archaeological finds, has sparked a number of theories, but nothing is conclusive.

Some of the earliest graphic records of a game similar to curling date from 1565. Two oil paintings by the Dutch master Pieter Bruegel, entitled "Winter Landscape with Skaters and a Birdtrap" and "Hunters in the Snow", show eisschiessen or "ice shooting", a Bavarian game played with a long stick-like handle, that is still enjoyed today. Another work, an engraving by R. de Baudous (1575 - 1644) after N. van Wieringen, entitled "Hyems" or "Winter", shows players who appear to be sliding large discs of wood along a frozen water-way. Other sketches from around the same time show a Dutch game called kuting, played with frozen lumps of earth.

The first hand-written record of what could be called an early curling game dates from February, 1540, when John McQuhin of Scotland noted down, in Latin, a challenge to a game on ice between a monk named John Sclater and an associate, Gavin Hamilton.

The first printed reference to curling appears in a 17th century elegy published by Henry Adamson, following the death of a close friend: His name was M. James Gall, a citizen of Perth, and a gentle-man of goodly stature, and pregnant wit, much given to pastime, as golf, archerie, curling and jovial companie. It seems too that the game tempted many people from all walks of life. Records from a Glasgow Assembly of Presbyterians in 1638 accused a certain Bishop Graham of Orkney of a terrible act: He was a curler on the ice on the Sabbath.

By the 18th century, curling had become a common past-time in Scotland. Both the poetry and the prose of the era provide numerous records of bonspiels, curling societies, and curling as a great national game.

The real controversy over the birthplace of the game was initiated by the Reverend John Ramsay of Gladsmuir, Scotland. In his book, An Account of the Game of Curling (Edinburgh 1811), he argued in favor of Continental beginnings. His research into the origins of curling words (examples: bonspiel, brough, colly, curl, kuting, quoiting, rink, and wick), led him to conclude that they were derived from Dutch or German. Claiming that most of the words were foreign, he wrote, but the whole of the terms being Continental compel us to ascribe to a Contintental origin.

The famous historian, the Reverend John Kerr contested Ramsay's views and campaigned in favor of Scottish beginnings to curling. In A History of Curling (1890), Kerr questioned: if Flemings had brought the game to Scotland in the 1500's, why did Scottish poets and historians make no special mention of its introduction before 1600?. He also saw no proof that many of the terms were Continental, explaining that many were of Celtic or Teutonic origin (examples: channel stone, crampit, draw, hack, hog, skip, tee, toesee, tramp, and tricker).

To add to the puzzle, archaeological evidence of a curling stone (the famous Stirling Stone) inscribed with the date 1511 turned up, along with another bearing the date 1551, when an old pond was drained at Dunblane, Scotland.

The true origin of curling is cloudy, lost in time. There is no doubt or dispute, however, that the Scots nurtured the game. They improved equipment, established rules, turned curling into a national past-time, and exported it to many other countries throughout the world.

Scott (left) and his curling team at Highland Country Club in London, Ontario. The other members, from left to right, are Micky, Brodie, and Michael.

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