OK, first off, I know why they use it…sort of. It roughs up the ice, which in turn slows down the stone, that way, they can hopefulyl have it stop where they want it, or have it hit the other stone they want it to at the right speed. My question, however, is this:
Why don’t they just not throw the stone as hard?
I imagine that when starting out, one is unfamiliar with the behavior of the stone on the ice, but after being in it for many years and being a pro, shouldn’t they be good enough to just know how hard to let go of the stoen so it hits what they want it to with the right speed? To compare, after many years of playing pro darts, one would know at what force and angle you need to throw it to get it to land where you want, so why isn’t it the same with curling? Aren’t they basically just taking the easy way out? (In that rather than build the skill of releasing the stone, they’d rather just use a broom.)
Sweeping, apparently, makes the stone travel farther and straighter. The target is about 120 feet away so the thrower can only do so much for accuracy.
This site has some good info: http://www.curlingschool.com/manual/index.html
First off, you’re wrong about the effect of sweeping. It causes the rock to travel further (and straighter, which is also important). It doesn’t slow the rock down.
Why not throw just the rock more accurately? Well, one tries, of course. Throwing accurately without sweepers is far more difficult than darts, however. Imagine trying to play darts with the dartboard 20’ away. Anyways, sweeping is just part of the game. Sure, you could play without them, but it wouldn’t be the same game anymore, just as you could play hockey without goalies, or baseball without gloves. (Why do they get to use gloves? Isn’t that just taking the easy way out?)
There’s also the issue of “picking”. Over the course of a game, a certain amount of small debris accumulates on the ice. When a rock travels over a piece of debris, there’s a good chance it will “pick”, that is, that it will drag the debris along for a bit, usually causing it to skew wildly from its intended path. Sweeping usually prevents this, which is why on a perfectly thrown rock you will hear the skip call “Clean only”, meaning that the sweepers should not sweep aggressively to alter the path of the rock, but just lightly sweep to ensure the rock doesn’t pick.
Also, there are shots that would not be possible without sweeping. For example, you might need the rock to travel straight for a while, and then curl at the end.
On NPR news the other day, a spectacular curling shot had caused them to interview the player who launched it. She explained that the friction of the sweeping briefly melts the surface, easing the stone’s travel. The path can be steered a little by sweeping only one side of the stone’s path.
I have never curled. I’m a fan, though. As a janitor, I always liked the one sport where the guy with a broom can be a hero.
I thought the rules stated that sweeping must be done directly in front of the rock.
However, I do know that it is becoming common for teams to switch the position of the two sweepers depending on whether you want more or less curl - the thinking being that the down-stroke has the most effect.
Since the sweepers usually face each other, ie one on each side of the rock’s path, you can have a choice of who sweeps closest to the rock, therefore which side the down-stroke comes from for the closest (most effective) sweeper.
Okay, now I understand the mechanics of how sweeping affects the movement of the stone. But for the life of me I just can’t figure out why it is considered fun.
This is a sport?–it’s sweeping the floor, fur cryin’ out loud.
[/ hijack.
Carry on ]
For the spectator, most of the time it isn’t. Like watching high-level pool players, when the game goes smoothly, each side makes a series of fairly predictable shots and the whole thing is low-key. What makes it worth watching (or at least watching a highlights reel) are the elaborate multi-rock (or ball) combination shots that are cool in their sheer elegance.
Kinda like watching NASCAR for the crashes. I mean, what other reason is there?
Throwing the stone is a precision sport. There are few rushes like throwing a perfect draw to the button, curling in behind a guard. When I’m on my game (which is admittedly rare), there are few sights as sweet as seeing a rock that you’ve thrown go 110’ feet down the ice and just tuck itself in, nice and tidy, on the exact spot that you wanted it to go, and knowing that the other side won’t be able to get it out.
Then there’s the strength side, the sturm und drang - what Gorsnak said. If your skip calls for a triple take-out, and you throw the stone just right, and you feel it humming down the ice, and you see it hit exactly on the opponents’ rocks, and you hear the CRACK as it hits the target, and you see the opponents’ three rocks rolling out, JUST AS YOU INTENDED, and you don’t think that’s exciting … words would fail me.
3 Curling is an aerobic sport - for the front end, at least. It’s far better to underthrow a rock than to overthrow, since if you throw it through the house it’s out of play, but if it comes up short, you still can use it. That means that good curlers tend to thow a bit light, and rely on their front end to sweep a stone into the house [this is partly an answer to the OP]. That means that if you’re lead or second, you’re busy sweeping a lot of rocks, while sliding sideways on the ice. Your heart gets a good work out, and your hand-leg coordination gets some good training. (In the year-end tourney in the little rink I play in, we won a game and the other side complimented us on the sweeping, because we all knew that our sweeping had kept us in the game, while their sweeping hadn’t been much.)
It’s a game that calls for considerable mental work by the skip and the third - some have described it as “chess on ice”. The skip has to think not only of what he/she wants to do with this shot - but also what the percentages are if we make it, and if we miss it. How will the other team respond, to either our miss or our making it? Where will their shot go? Three shots from now, where will we be?
There is the frustration of reading the ice. Not only do you have to worry about your shots, you should always be watching the other shots, by the other team and your own (while you’re sweeping, mind) to see how the ice is playing. Are there spots where it’s heavy (i.e. - the rock loses momentum considerably on a particular patch)? Is one side of the sheet more or less heavy than the other? Is there frost on the ice that’s slowing it down?
It’s fun playing in shirtsleeves in a rink that’s about 3º or 4º above zero C. (Okay, maybe only Canadians and Minnesotans find that fun. )
It’s one of the few sports where anyone who is really interested can reasonably hope to compete at the highest levels of the sport in the nation or the world, if they really commit to it and have a modicum of talent. Here in Canada at least, the players who go on to the provincial, national and world championships all start out playing in the same local tournaments as everyone else. A few years ago, we were sitting around after our game and someone commented that we wouldn’t be playing the next week, because the rink had something else on. I asked what was on, and someone said “the city-wide bonspiel”. Someone else interupted and said “No, it’s the opening round of the worlds.” They were both right. The winners from the city bonspiels go on to the provincials; the winners of the provincials all meet in the nationals; and the winners of that go to the worlds. There’s no sharp division between amateur and professional - we’re all curlers (of considerably varying skills!)
In what other sports is beer considered such an integral part of the game that a bar is a required part of the facility?
I vaguely recall an article describing curling in Time magazine, likely coinciding with the last winter Olympics. The author described a player releasing the stone with the gentleness of God touching the hand of Adam. I can think of no better sports metaphor than this.
