Smart Curling [1] is a book that really isn’t so much about curling as it is about communication, team performance and team dynamics, using curling as its context. As such, Vera Pezer’s 177-page volume is the single most comprehensive introduction to team dynamics and communication that I have thus far come across, so I recommend this book for every curling coach, recreational or competitive.
The author of Smart Curling is Saskatchewan legend and Canadian Curling Hall of Fame member Vera Pezer, four-time Canadian Women’s Champion (three as a skip, one as third for Joyce McKee) who holds a PhD in sports psychology from the University of Saskatchewan and is currently Chancellor of that university.
Smart Curling is unlike other books on sports psychology in that it provides insight into communication and concentration skills that are important to curling and less so to other sports. Here is a quote from pages 104-105:
When it comes to actual execution, curling is not much different from other team sports where athletes play specific positions that call for specialized skills and where success depends on how well each player performs. Quarterbacking a football team, pitching a baseball, or skipping a curling team all require skills specific to each position. What makes curling unique is the interdependence between the skip and those who play the other positions. Quarterbacks and pitchers rely on teammates to successfully complete a play, but they don’t have to communicate directly to make this happen the way a skip does in a curling game. Similarly, receivers and fielders don’t have the same input in strategy and play selection during a game that leads, seconds, and thirds do. This is the element of curling that demands cohesiveness between teammates unlike that in any other sport….
…being a cohesive team also involves being patient with teammates’ different personalities and accepting the leadership that is inherent in the role of the skip but expressed in other forms by teammates. More than anything, teamwork requires curlers to set aside their individual egos for the good of the team.
Smart Curling, while targeted at competitive junior and adult teams, contains a spectrum of information about the psychology of performance including:
- managing excitement, motivation, and stress during play;
- mental training, specifically the use of imagery, both to review past performances and as a form of rehearsal for future games;
- the role of personality (introversion and extroversion) in contributing to a team’s success;
- maintaining confidence and managing slumps and other negative thinking that occur both within a game and between games.
As a coach of Little Rock and bantam players, the two additional topics most worthwhile for me were the sections on concentration and communication. Pezer devotes several pages to the technique of concentration, braking it down into four specific areas (broad, narrow, internal, and external) as described by sports psychologist Robert Nideffer. Pezer then describes how each of the four kinds of concentration are related to specific acts or stimuli in curling and how to manage the distractions that occur during games so as to minimize their impact. Most notably, she concludes with practice drills on how to improve concentration in each of the four areas, and these drills are appropriate for bantam-aged players.
Smart Curling also offers depth in team communication and how to manage conflict. Once again, this section of the book is also targeted at junior and/or adult competitive teams, though communication is an important topic even for Little Rock and bantam coaches as we field teams of recreational players to play in bonspiels and exhibition games. Here is a passage from pages 84-85:
Effective communication can take a team a long way in competition but only if everyone on the team makes an honest and deliberate effort to understand and be understood (more on problems with teammates in the next chapter). The best teams develop consistent, precise technical language that they use on the ice to communicate rock movement and rotation, weight, and line to ensure that a thrown rock finishes as accurately as possible, A simple word like “room” tell sweepers that a rock has sufficient room (at that moment) to get by a guard and they can concentrate mainly on weight. The brusher who replies “six” is telling the skip, based on the team’s system for judging weight, where the rock is expected to finish.
In coaching my bantam teams we emphasize the importance of this communication on the ice. Just as important, however, is her discussion of the importance of off-ice communication and team dynamics, a critical subject for coaches at any level.
Smart Curling is an excellent book that I don’t hesitate to recommend.
[1] Vera Pezer (2008). Smart Curling: how to perfect your game through mental training. Fifth House Limited, Calgary, Alberta. ISBN 978-1-897252-03-1.