Our latest staff extravaganza was a trip to the curling rink in Megève for a lesson in this most ancient and silly looking of winter sports. One shoe gets a slippery over-shoe put on it and the other shoe acts as your ‘grip’. The objective of the game is to launch your stone (which are incredibly heavy, there’s no way you’re lifting one of those babies up off the ice) straight down the centre of the rink (about 4.5m across and 45m long) and into the centre of the bulls eye. It is no easy task, as most of us found out despite the extremely friendly Sophie (our teacher, in the middle of the photo) doing her best to make us understand what to do!
If the stone touches the side of the rink or goes beyond the line at the end it’s out of play. The sweepers are there to a) give tactical advice to the person launching the stone and b) make the stone go faster by sweeping in front of it if needs be.
If the stone touches the side of the rink or goes beyond the line at the end it’s out of play. The sweepers are there to a) give tactical advice to the person launching the stone and b) make the stone go faster by sweeping in front of it if needs be.
After get a few tutorials in the basics it was onto a game – girls versus boys (oh how obvious we are). Most of us were absolutely useless (see video here - hopefully the link works) but Lauren had the ultimate turn – check out the perfection in the photos!
Unfortunately, Lauren’s stone got knocked out by the eventually victorious boys’ team on the very next go…
Awesome fun though, so if ever anyone’s near NZ’s only curling rink somewhere deep in the heart of the South Island, I’d give it a go! Check out more photos here.
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