Bill Tschirhart has been involved in coaching the sport of curling for many years. I was first introduced to Bill in 1990 when he was coach of the University of Waterloo varsity curling teams, which was Bill’s first coaching position. Since then, Bill has held coaching positions provincially and nationally, coached at both national and international events, and at one time was Curling Canada’s national development coach at Curling Canada’s National Training Centre (NTC) in Calgary.
Over the years Bill has published a number of articles about coaching the sport of curling, both in print media and on the web, and in addition launched an online blog a few years ago. Today, Bill can be found on the airwaves with his Pane in the Glass Podcast, which can be found through most podcast channels including Apple.
Contents
The short essays in A Pane in the Glass are grouped by topic: Coaching, Technical, Team Dynamics, Strategy, Physical Preparation and Nutrition, Mental Preparation, General Interest, with essays by different authors featured in each section. An exception to this rule is the collection of essays on Physical Preparation and Nutrition, which are written entirely by Bob Comartin. One of these, entitled Women are Smarter Than Men (doh!), argues about the need for warmup prior to beginning play, which I’ve written about previously. Here’s an excerpt [1, pp 187]:
Dynamic stretching helps reduce stiffness, improve circulation, and allows muscles to contract with greater force. Sliding or brushing without warming up will likely create microtears in soft tissue which creates a bit of swelling and tight feeling around the joint. Doing this many times without proper recovery creates an overuse or chronic injury. Without warming up, you may notice this in your knee on the first few slides or in your shoulder when you start brushing; however, it may even go away during play. Afterwards when the swelling sits in and stiffness occurs, that’s when you notice it. If this continues over the years, it can lead to surgery or an early end to competitive curling. Shoulder rolls, trunk rotations, leg swings are examples of dynamic stretching.
While there is a wealth of information about technique in the book, a lot of the emphasis – being that this is “A Coach’s Companion” – concerns team dynamics, team communication, and mental preparation, and how as a coach you can lead your team towards their goals by assisting them in these areas.
Bill’s essays cover a wide time period. Over time, some of his ideas have changed and minor differences can be found amongst the essays contained in this volume. One contradiction I’ll point out is that a number of years ago Bill was an advocate of a single hack on the centre line. In speaking to him at the 2012 Glenn Howard fantasy camp in Guelph, Bill admitted to me that he had changed his mind – there is a point to having separate hacks for left- and right-handed throwers.
Nonetheless, for curling coaches “A Pane in the Glass” is a great resource. We are pleased to offer a selection of Bill’s essays on this site.
[1] Bill Tschirhart (2010). A Pane in the Glass: A Coach’s Companion. Corporate Imaging Centre, London, Ontario. ISBN 978-0-9866513-0-4.