Tuesday, February 18, 2014

CURLING

Last night Ryan and I went CURLING!! 


Ry had seen it on the Olympics (just like everyone else I'm sure... I even had someone mention that NBC, the station playing the Olympics, stood for Nothing But Curling), so looked up to see if there were any options to curl around Southern California and LOW-AND-BEHOLD San Diego has their own Curling Club! AND they were having an Open House right near us just a few days later!

Source

WE HAD A BLAST! I was honestly a little worried about it. Ryan had mentioned he wanted to go and at first I tried to get him to find someone else to go with. I figured it would be some boring old guy just talking about the history and maybe we get a minute or two of actually "playing" with the other 3 or 4 people that show up. Boy was I wrong!

When we got there (it started at 6pm, we got there around 5:50pm) there was already a long line of probably 30 people in front of us (I would say there were at least 100 of us when we left around 7:45pm, not sure if more came later). Once we signed our waivers and paid (it was only $5 a person, which I thought was a GREAT deal especially compared to an open skate, but shoot, then again I don't have much to compare it to, I'd never curled before!), we went over for a brief safety meeting. They told us not to run, not to go backwards on the ice, if you fall - tuck your chin to protect your head, and don't get overly confident - because right about the time you are getting confident is when the soles of your shoes are freezing (about 20-30 minutes depending on your shoe type) and YOU WILL FALL.


A little nervous during the safety meeting


After we got the thumbs up from the safety class (it was really only about 4 or 5 minutes long) we headed out on the ice.


Before we hit the ice

The first station was the sweeping. Ryan and I swept together, so I don't have any action shots of it. The point is the person closest to the rock can't hit the rock (or it is a penalty) and the person furthest from the rock should be as close to the other sweeper as possible but not hit them. Once we tested out the brooms we knew this evening would be a LOT hard than we were originally expecting.

He thought I said to give me a tough face... I didn't.

This might be his Curling trading card shot!

The next station we went to was to start sliding. We had to rocks (they are 42 pounds each), one for each hand. We put our left foot on a slider (it was like a little piece of plastic that allowed your foot to slide really easily) and put our right foot in the hack (the foot holder from where you push off). Then you held on the two stones and slid, trying to put all of your weight on the left side and dragging your right leg behind you.









Starting to have fun!

The next station felt like a BIG jump. This station they took away the stone on the left hand side and actually gave you a broom. THIS IS A LOT HARDER TO BALANCE ON! You are supposed to put your weight on the left leg and broom, that way when you release the stone you don't tip over... Easier said than done.



He looks almost professional, huh?!






Oh, we love our adventures!

The next station was similar to the last, since you had the broom and the stone, but you actually let go of the stone. Like I mentioned, it was a lot harder than it looks. As you can see from the video of Ryan, he wiped out the first time ;)

Pulling up my pants... Maybe skinny jeans weren't the way to go for curling ;)




Release the rock!

I'm doing it! And I didn't even tip over!






The last station was actually "playing" a little mock game. There were two people that were sweepers and one person actually sending the rock down the ice.





We had a ton of fun. Ryan is actually talking about going to the next introductory class on Saturday night to get to play a little more (once you go to the official class you can go and play pick-up games).




I know curling may seem a little "lame" (or at least that is what I thought when I originally saw it), but we actually had a great time. I would definitely recommend it if you ever have the opportunity to try it out!

Have you ever tried curling? 

1 comment:

Evelin said...

It looks like SO MUCH FUN! Love how great you guys are with getting photos of your adventures, almost feels like we were with you guys playing on that ice. If hubs and I ever get to your area I will force you two to take us out for some fun, ok? :)