Curling

Curling

Curling games taking place during the 2005 Tim Hortons Brier
Highest governing body	World Curling Federation
Nicknames	Chess On Ice, The Roaring Game
First played	Approximately late medieval Scotland
Registered players	est. 1.5 million[1]
Characteristics
Contact	No
Team members	4 per team (2 in doubles)
Mixed-sex	Yes; see mixed curling
Type	Precision and accuracy
Equipment	Curling brooms, stones (rocks), curling shoes
Venue	Curling sheet
Glossary	Glossary of curling
Presence
Olympic	First event in 1924 (retroactively made official in 2006) Demonstration sport in 1932, 1988 and 1992 Officially added in 1998
Paralympic	Wheelchair curling officially added in 2006

Curling is a sport in which players slide stones on a sheet of ice toward a target area that is segmented into four concentric circles. It is related to bowls, boules, and shuffleboard. Two teams, each with four players, take turns sliding heavy, polished granite stones, also called rocks, across the ice curling sheet toward the house, a circular target marked on the ice.^[2] Each team has eight stones, with each player throwing two. The purpose is to accumulate the highest score for a game; points are scored for the stones resting closest to the centre of the house at the conclusion of each end, which is completed when both teams have thrown all of their stones once. A game usually consists of eight or ten ends.^[3]

Players induce a curved path, described as curl, by causing the stone to slowly rotate as it slides. The path of the rock may be further influenced by two sweepers with brooms or brushes, who accompany it as it slides down the sheet and sweep the ice in front of the stone. "Sweeping a rock" decreases the friction, which makes the stone travel a straighter path (with less curl) and a longer distance. A great deal of strategy and teamwork go into choosing the ideal path and placement of a stone for each situation, and the skills of the curlers determine the degree to which the stone will achieve the desired result.