Curling and Team
Curling is a precision team sport similar to bowls or bocce, played on a rectangular sheet of prepared ice by two teams of four players each, using heavy polished granite stones which players slide down the ice towards a target area called the house. Points are scored for the number of stones that a team has closer to the centre of the target than the closest of the other team's stones.
The game is thought to have been invented in late medieval Scotland, with the first written reference to a contest using stones on ice coming from the records of Paisley Abbey, Renfrew, in February 1541.
In the early history of curling, the rocks were simply flat-bottomed river stones which were sometimes notched or shape; the thrower had little control over the rock, and relied more on luck than skill to win, unlike today's reliance on skill and strategy. Outdoor curling was very popular in Scotland between the sixteenth and the nineteenth centuries as the climate provided good ice conditions every winter.
Curling has been an official sport in the Winter Olympic Games since the 1998 Winter Olympics. In February 2006, the International Olympic Committee retroactively decided that the curling competition from the 1924 Winter Olympics would be considered official Olympic events and no longer be considered demonstration events. Thus, the first Olympic medals in curling, which at the time was played outside, were awarded for the 1924 Winter Games with the gold medal won by Great Britain and Ireland, two silver medals by Sweden and the bronze by France.
The first curling club in the United States was organized in 1831 only 30 miles from Detroit at Orchard Lake, Michigan. Called the 'Orchard Lake Curling Club', the club used hickory block 'stones'. A Detroit Curling Club was started back in 1840 when Michigan only had a population of 212,000 and had only been in the Union for three years. About this time an organization called the 'Thistle Club' was founded and, curling
The game is thought to have been invented in late medieval Scotland, with the first written reference to a contest using stones on ice coming from the records of Paisley Abbey, Renfrew, in February 1541.
In the early history of curling, the rocks were simply flat-bottomed river stones which were sometimes notched or shape; the thrower had little control over the rock, and relied more on luck than skill to win, unlike today's reliance on skill and strategy. Outdoor curling was very popular in Scotland between the sixteenth and the nineteenth centuries as the climate provided good ice conditions every winter.
Curling has been an official sport in the Winter Olympic Games since the 1998 Winter Olympics. In February 2006, the International Olympic Committee retroactively decided that the curling competition from the 1924 Winter Olympics would be considered official Olympic events and no longer be considered demonstration events. Thus, the first Olympic medals in curling, which at the time was played outside, were awarded for the 1924 Winter Games with the gold medal won by Great Britain and Ireland, two silver medals by Sweden and the bronze by France.
The first curling club in the United States was organized in 1831 only 30 miles from Detroit at Orchard Lake, Michigan. Called the 'Orchard Lake Curling Club', the club used hickory block 'stones'. A Detroit Curling Club was started back in 1840 when Michigan only had a population of 212,000 and had only been in the Union for three years. About this time an organization called the 'Thistle Club' was founded and, curling