| Curling Revisited |
I know I brought this up before but it so makes a nice segway into today's blog.
In my two years of attempting to Curl, besides having a blast (I highly recommend it), I also learned a lot about how they prepared the ice.
When you see people running, or more accurately, sliding up and down the ice you may wonder how it is they can do that without falling. You don't? Well just give me a break and pretend you do.
Well it turns out the ice is very carefully prepared. If the rink has it, they can use a zamboni to clear the ice. They can also use a machine to shave the ice. The trick is to make the ice very smooth. You do not want the ice to influence the rock (what you throw to the other end). I don't know about you but I would kill myself on ice like that. Because of this, and probably more importantly, to give the rock something to grip to, they pebble the ice.
Basically when pebbling, they take water in a tank with a sprinkling wand on the end and walk around the ice shaking the wand. More or less it looks like they are blessing the ice. What happens is the water then freezes into these uniform little droplets of ice on top of the smooth ice. This is what your shoes can actually grip to and what helps the rocks. It provides some friction that, when the rock is moving fast or the sweepers are sweeping hard (often accompanied by the skip loudly yelling SWEEP! or HURRY!), it goes straight, but when it is moving slower, the rock actually grips the pebbles of ice and curls to the left or the right depending on how the rock was spun on release by the curler and many other things like inperfections in the ice.
I know it does not sound like it but it really is a fun sport. I truly love it. So what does this all have to do with today's blog? Well this morning when I went out to my car to head into work I found that my windshield had been pebbled with ice. After clearing the rest of the windows with a brush, I had to scrape the windshield. Boy did that windshield bring back memories. On the short dive into work I was also reminded of curling as I slipped a bit on my way into work. Of course for me I was such a klutz on the ice that, while never falling down, it was often a struggle to keep up with the rock and also be able to sweep. I had my other problems with curling and you would have thought I would have hated it but no. I will always remember my 2 years curling as a great time. So if you should ever come across curling give it a chance before moving on. Oh and I think I forgot the most import part. In curling, at least at the Detroit Curling Club where I was a member, it was tradition for the winner to buy the drinks. Maybe that is the real reason I love curling so.
Slip sliding away, slip sliding away
You know the nearer your destination, the more you slip sliding away
-- Simon & Garfunkel; Slip Sliding Away
In my two years of attempting to Curl, besides having a blast (I highly recommend it), I also learned a lot about how they prepared the ice.
When you see people running, or more accurately, sliding up and down the ice you may wonder how it is they can do that without falling. You don't? Well just give me a break and pretend you do.
Well it turns out the ice is very carefully prepared. If the rink has it, they can use a zamboni to clear the ice. They can also use a machine to shave the ice. The trick is to make the ice very smooth. You do not want the ice to influence the rock (what you throw to the other end). I don't know about you but I would kill myself on ice like that. Because of this, and probably more importantly, to give the rock something to grip to, they pebble the ice.
Basically when pebbling, they take water in a tank with a sprinkling wand on the end and walk around the ice shaking the wand. More or less it looks like they are blessing the ice. What happens is the water then freezes into these uniform little droplets of ice on top of the smooth ice. This is what your shoes can actually grip to and what helps the rocks. It provides some friction that, when the rock is moving fast or the sweepers are sweeping hard (often accompanied by the skip loudly yelling SWEEP! or HURRY!), it goes straight, but when it is moving slower, the rock actually grips the pebbles of ice and curls to the left or the right depending on how the rock was spun on release by the curler and many other things like inperfections in the ice.
I know it does not sound like it but it really is a fun sport. I truly love it. So what does this all have to do with today's blog? Well this morning when I went out to my car to head into work I found that my windshield had been pebbled with ice. After clearing the rest of the windows with a brush, I had to scrape the windshield. Boy did that windshield bring back memories. On the short dive into work I was also reminded of curling as I slipped a bit on my way into work. Of course for me I was such a klutz on the ice that, while never falling down, it was often a struggle to keep up with the rock and also be able to sweep. I had my other problems with curling and you would have thought I would have hated it but no. I will always remember my 2 years curling as a great time. So if you should ever come across curling give it a chance before moving on. Oh and I think I forgot the most import part. In curling, at least at the Detroit Curling Club where I was a member, it was tradition for the winner to buy the drinks. Maybe that is the real reason I love curling so.
Slip sliding away, slip sliding away
You know the nearer your destination, the more you slip sliding away
-- Simon & Garfunkel; Slip Sliding Away
Posted by barman at 10:34 AM::
That was a mess this morning. I got lucky and didn't have too many problems getting around. Thank God I have a garage so I didn't have to scrape the car.
I am interested in curling but there isn't much of it around here going on. Sounds like fun!
Singgurl, I have a garage also but I need to make room. I guess it is time to make it a priority.
As far as I know there are only three places in our state that has curling. They are in Lewiston, Midland, and Ferndale. So none are all that close. To bad, I used to be able to bring people to Sunday morning Sinners. Basically it was Sunday morning and everyone that came was fed a breakfast, beverages and had a quick introduction to curling with curling 2 or 3 ends. If it were only closer I would love to gather up people. I am sure I could arrange it somehow. Alas, my club is over 2 hours away.
I saw a lot of curling growning up in South East Michigan with a Canada station being part of your basic networks. You had ABC, CBS, NBC and CBC. What a shock when I moved away.
Dive_goddess, the commute for me was OK. Others had it much worse. The roads have gotten better. Probably the only time you might see curling is at 3:00 in the morning during the winter olympics, if that.
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