Curling in Owatonna
March 5th, 2005,You may have seen it on TV: a person sends a round stone sliding down an ice surface, then two people sweep furiously in front of the stone as it approaches a target at the far end of the ice. The sport I’m describing, of course, is curling, and I recently had the opportunity to give it a try.
On a Saturday morning in February about a dozen of us traveled south to a curling club in Owatonna, Minnesota. Steve McKelvey, an experienced curler and a mathematics professor and dean at St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota, generously organized the outing as a way for people to learn about the sport.
We began by gathering in the comfortable warming area of the small club, where Steve gave us a primer on the game. He informed us that curling probably began in Scotland hundreds of years ago. The sport is especially popular on the Iron Range of northern Minnesota and in Canada’s prairie provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta. The St. Paul Curling Club, founded in 1888, boasts that it is the largest member-owned curling club in the United States.
A curling match involves two teams of four players each. They take turns in a series of rounds called “ends,” in which each player throws (slides) two stones. The stones really are made of quarried stone, and at 42 and a half pounds each, they’re quite heavy. A match usually consists of eight ends.
Teams win points by having their stones stop in the targeted area at the end of the ice, called the “house.” A team receives one point for each stone that is closer to the center of the house than any of the other team’s stones. Stones can be bumped from the house by other stones.
Teams alternate in the delivery of stones, and the team that goes last has an advantage called “having the hammer.” They get the last chance to knock the other team’s stones out. The team that has the least number of points gets the hammer for the next end.
The person that delivers the last stones for a team is usually the best player. The “skip,” as this person is called, also directs the other players in the placement of their stones. The “curling” part of the sport comes into play when a player “curls,” or curves, the stone by giving it a slight spin left or right when it is delivered.
According to Steve, curling is “a game of character and honor.” For example, all fouls are called by the person committing them. Both teams treat each other with respect, and players avoid celebrating the other team’s errors or misfortunes. The winning team even has to clean the ice at the conclusion of the match.
After our primer, we progressed to getting familiar with the ice and the movement of the stones on it, sliding the stones back and forth across the narrow width of the club’s two curling lanes. The ice surface itself differs from a typical skating rink. It’s altered by sprinkling drops of water on it, which somehow allows the stones to slid more easily and therefore farther.
We then practiced sliding the stones the length of the ice. Delivery of a stone begins by putting a foot in the “hack”–a wooden block similar to a starting block on a running track. Holding onto the handle of the stone, you then push off from the hack, slide on the ice, and release the stone–all while in a crouching position close to the ice. Curlers wear special “sliders” made of plastic on their feet to allow them to slide while delivering the stone. We also practiced sweeping. The purpose of sweeping is to slightly alter the ice surface and allow the stone to slide with less resistance.
As we played an abbreviated version of a match, I managed to become somewhat competent at delivering the stone. It reminded me a bit of throwing a bowling ball, though curling involves the more difficult task of sliding on ice. I found it difficult to get the range down and managed to get only one or two stones to stay in the house. Others in the group had similar difficulties, as stones usually went short or long. Most of us ended up losing our balance and sprawled on the ice at least once as we practiced our delivery.
Curling reminds me of shuffleboard and lawn bowling or bocce ball, games that more people are familiar with. All of these games involve getting objects close to a target, and they include the option of bumping the other team’s objects out of the way or using the object to block those thrown by the other team.
I enjoyed my curling experience, though my middle-aged knees hurt afterward because of the crouched position required when delivering the stones. Also, I didn’t wear warm socks, and my feet got very cold from standing on the ice.
As I warmed my feet on the stove in the warming area and the circulation painfully returned, I was reminded of similar experiences in warming houses long ago as a hockey-playing kid. The next time I go curling, I’ll definitely wear wool socks.