Scottish Blog

Curling is an international ice-sport that holds its origins in Scotland.

Curling is known by most people around the world, but the knowledge of the sport does not necessarily lead to an understanding of its intricacies and roots in Scottish culture.

The wider perception of curling outside of Scotland and other countries where curling is a prominent sport, is that it involves nothing more than throwing stones at a target and sweeping the ice. In fact this opinion is optimized by a quote from Chris Barley, an American Basketball player, “Curling is not a sport. I called my grandmother and told her she could win a gold medal because they have dusting in the Olympics now.” In fact, the strategic nature of the placement of the stones and physical difficulty in delivering the stones to the correct positions has seen some people dub Curling as “chess on ice”.

Curling is played on various surface specification and rules depending on the nature of the game, be it professional, Olympic or recreational. Ideally though, the curling field (called a sheet) is to be played on a sheet sized to World Curling Federation standards. These consist of a rectangle 45.50 meters in length and 4.32 meters in width, with a surface that is perfectly level. Upon freezing the surface is sprayed with a small amount of water which collects into droplets and freezes, causing friction on the playing surface, which invariably leads the curling stone to bank to either the left or right during its movement. The motion is called a curl, the origin of the sports name. This setup is also the reason behind the iconic sweepers, whose job is to either reduce or increase relative friction on the ice surface to alter the speed and direction of the curling stone. This combined with the fact that there are a number of stones surrounding the target from previous throws, makes curling a difficult sport, as previously mentioned.

Evidently Scotland was the first nation in the world to see curling in a form resembling its modern day from. Although its exact origins are unknown even to the most adamant of researchers, some facts about are known. Curling was first mentioned in an official document in 1541. A tournament was recorded to be held in Renfrewshire. As this was an organized tournament it would indicate that curling enjoyed a relatively strong popularity prior to this in Scotland.