Curling

[bmblank]

Yep. These days i think they normally put the harder blue hone on both the top and the bottom, cause then you can get twice the time on it before needing to dress the running band. The handles just twist off and you can flip the stone.
But it's pretty neat.
A friend (and team-mate) of mine tried making his own stones out of epoxy and whatnot. I mean, how hard could it be? It's just for the ice out on the lakes, anyway, it doesn't need to be perfect.
Basically ended up with 30lb paperweights. They're all but useless on the ice.

 

[skeets]

 

[bmblank]

Now, instead of rolling, they need to make one that just kicks out of the hack and still has to account for speed and everything. The biggest part is knowing when to release. Throwing hard, you need to release earlier, while you still have speed from kicking out. So while sliding with the stone, you still have to determine whether you kicked out hard enough or too hard. Trying to throw the same stone you just threw? Oh, but it feels like you kicked out just a little bit harder than last time? Maybe you did, maybe you didn't. How does that equate as far as when to release?
It's a very complex game. And that's not even talking about PLANNING the shots.

 

[Tim Horton]

It was said while they were playing curling before the opening cerimonies that the Canadian womens team was a gold medal favorite.. I got to watch a little at a cafe in town during lunch.. Do not know how the team placed..

My favorite is biathalon.. Years ago while teaching Firearms Safety courses occasionally there were students, youth and adult, from the local biathalon club.. There would be a broom stick of a 12 year old girl come to class on her street skies with dad following in the mini van.. Dead give away what was going on.. On range day the biathalon club members were the best shots by far...

 

[jyoutz]

I'd like to try that curling as an outdoor sport. How do you think those stones would do on freshly mowed grass? I've been doing curling exercises for almost 60 years now so I should be in pretty good shape for it.

Brown bottle arm curls?

 

[dlsmith]

Years ago when I had a 10' satellite dish and few channels were scrambled, I used to watch curling on CBC. Was pretty interesting to see the techniques and strategies the teams used.
Wish I could still get CNC, especially CBC North that had a lot of programming about the northern territories and indigenous peoples.

I could also get bullfights from Mexico sometimes.

 

[bmblank]

It's really amazing how much the sport has changed, even since I started curling 8 years ago. I can only imagine the changes that have happened in the 10-20 years before that. I mean, you can still buy hog-hair brooms. I mean, heaven forbid I have to switch to a synthetic-hair broom.[/s] Mine is carbon fiber - super light, nice and strong. It was really only $20 more than the "fiberlite" (mix of cf and fiberglass) and the weight savings is pretty ridiculous.

It's easier than ever to watch curling. Youtube channels, galore.

Brown bottle arm curls?

Plenty of that going on during a normal league night. Well, not exactly... Glass isn't allowed out on the ice.

 

[skeets]

So really its shuffle board with rocks on ice?

 

[jyoutz]

So really its shuffle board with rocks on ice?

That’s what it looks like to me.

 

[sagor]

So really its shuffle board with rocks on ice?

Not quite the same. When one spins the stone on release, it will "curl" as it slows down and approaches the other end. Hence the name. The amount of curl can be as much as 4 to 6 feet!. The curl allows one to make a shot around a stone in front, with the proper skill.
The reason the stone curls is as it spins, one side (backspin) sits longer in slow contact with the ice, "sticking" more. The other side (spin forward) is moving faster and sticks less.
The speed of the stone also determines how much curl. Too fast, and it curls less. Too slow, and it never reaches the target location or curls too much. The amount of spin is also a factor. If you spin it too fast, less effect because all surfaces are moving faster than the ice speed. A slow curl will dig in sooner and curl sooner, but again, speed of the stone is a factor. The key is to have the stone speed approach "slow" as it approaches the target and the spin then digs in more creating more "curl" as it slows to a stop.

 

[bmblank]

It's OK sagor. I suspect skeets just really knows what buttons to push to trigger curlers.

 

[mikester]

I watched on the Olympics the last winter one - fascinating sport - like a chess match on ice...... and one screwup .... game over!

Down in these parts ...... aint enough ice to play inside!!!

Curious ..... what does a set of stones cost? or is that something you never buy or is that supplied by the rink ?

I don't understand why curling is an olympic sport but darts and dwarf tossing isn't

 

[bmblank]

Give it a shot and you'll understand.


Can tell the Olympics are over. Very noticeable drop in curling conversations (here and everywhere on the internet).

 

[Freeheeler]

Another excuse to drink with your friends, like golf and cornhole. Sounds fun but not a lot of curling going on here in TN. We throw metal half rings at metal stakes in the ground with our non-drinking hand.

 

[bmblank]

To be honest, I wish there were a little more time for drinking when curling. I can usually get about 2 beers in in the 2 hours of curling, but I have to remind myself that it's there. If I'm not throwing, I'm following a stone down the ice or walking back to the hack. The times where we are on the outside and I can put my beer on the boards halfway down the ice is awesome. Every time I walk past it I'm able to take a swig if I want to.

 

[aaluck]

Then another 10 or 15 minutes of pebbling the ice... That is, curling isn't played on smooth ice, it is played on a rough surface created by essentially raining water onto it. The stones won't go anywhere otherwise.

This is what I found fascinating when watching the olympics this year. I had no idea there was a difference.

So how exactly do they do this? Do they have something overhead that creates 'rain' for a couple of seconds (for the olympics) and how do they do it at your facility? Or do they do it the same ? I'm curious.

 

[bmblank]

Basically backpack sprayers. Except, they're not just spraying... A backpack sprayer full of hot water, except a big hose running to a "pebbling head".

I'm at work, so I didn't really watch this video, but it shows everything...
Backpack of hot water with a hose to a pebbling head. It's all gravity fed, so you hold your hand up when you don't want to spray water. Drop your hand and walk backwards down the sheet at a certain speed. Takes practice. The water sprays upwards from the pebbling head. When you get to the end of the sheet (being careful not to trip over the hack), you raise up the pebbling head to stop the flow. Repeat on the next sheet.
Do that a couple times and you'll have something playable.

The nice thing about dedicated ice is that just builds up on top of itself. The texture of dedicated ice is very "orange peel" like. It's almost like it's a lump of sintered ice, if you're familiar with sintering metals. On our ice, it's like flat ice with bumps on it. If we take our time and get enough bumps on it the stones will run pretty smooth. But that also takes away from play time, so that's kind of a give and take.

We also run a "crusher" over our ice. Basically we use a rack-full of stones to knock the tops off the pebbling and make it smooth. On dedicated ice they have a nipper, which nips the top off the pebble. That job takes a ton of skill.
For dedicated ice they'll make one pass with the pebbler and run the nipper every couple of games.

 

[bmblank]

(still at work)
This looks like a good one...

Ice prep is a lot like field prep in football or baseball. You really could set somebody up with a "home advantage" if you were looking to. It's very temperature and humidity dependent, and changes if you're looking for a 12 second stone or a 13 second stone, if you want more or less curl, so many variables that, honestly at our level, doesn't change the game all that much. But we're getting there.