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Training tips for dryland closed brushing practice with a footwork trainer
This article is joint work with John Newhook of Dalhousie University. In use, through trial-and-error over the years we have found the best practice surface for dryland training to be the gravel midfield of a softball diamond. An asphalt or concrete surface hinders effective foot movement, which is required to produce the “half-moons” that optimally both propel the brusher down the sheet, and get one’s feet outside of the hip line to provide greater force through the arms and hence the brush head. A ball diamond or a fine gravel driveway permits practice with good foot movement, and moreover the athlete’s footwork evidence can be seen in the gravel after each attempt, augmenting any video taken during the training session. It should be clear that practicing on gravel is not the same as practicing on-ice; the surfaces are quite different. Nonetheless, a gravel surface permits one’s feet to “slide” in a manner similar to what one could do on-ice, and
Building a dryland closed footwork trainer
Since publishing the first article about the footwork trainer in June 2016, a number of people have asked for more detailed specifications and additional photographs so that they can construct their own. The trainer itself is simple to construct. The parts list is as follows: two 30-inch wood pieces of 2×6 glued and screwed together using 3-inch brass wood screws; one 30-inch piece of 2×4 attached to the top, again using 3-inch brass screws; two 18-inch 2×4 pieces for the trainer’s wheelbase. Note that the length of these pieces depends on the thickness of the wheel hubs of the wheels you’ll be using. You might find a length of 16.5 inches works better with metal hub wheels that are 1.75 inches wide. two 24-inch long, 1/2 inch threaded rods that serve as the axles, along with appropriate 1/2 inch nuts, washers, lock-washers, and locknuts; four standard 7-inch lawnmower wheels, purchased from Home Hardware. 8-inch wheels will also work – they’ll
Dryland training for brushing footwork
This article is a revision to an article that originally was published on the Ontario Curling Council website on 11 June 2016. In the Curling Canada High Performance Program coaching manual, under “Technical Development: Sweeping”, you will find the following quote attributed to Darryl Horne: Without doubt sweeping is the most under-coached, under-practiced, under-appreciated, and under-rated aspect of the game. In my experience in working with U15, U18, and U20 teams over the past 14 seasons, a common development issue with athletes is in mastering the biomechanics necessary for brushing effectively, that is insuring that the forces the athlete develops through the brush handle are optimal to the task. To assist athletes with learning the correct footwork for brushing in the closed stance, in the spring of 2016 I built a “footwork trainer” (see video at right) that athletes could use through the spring and summer in order to gain sufficient speed, stamina, and muscle memory in order to achieve
Mapping delivery split times to hog-to-hog times
In a previous article, John Newhook and I described ten reasons why the use of split times can be problematic for a team. Using interval, or “split” times, can benefit the delivering team because an interval time provides a proxy measurement for the velocity of a curling stone at the point of release. With an interval time, the two brushers can utilize the time to assist with their weight judgement, and the delivering player can use a split time to assist their delivery with respect to weight control. One of the complications that we mentioned was that there is no straightforward, easy-to-compute mapping between split times and hog-to-hog times. Not only are interval times subject to user error, but the mapping between a split and a hog-to-hog time depends to a significant extent on a particular athlete’s delivery technique (rate of deceleration during the slide phase, and/or an accompanying arm extension, to name but two), ice conditions (to the point,
High-performance brushing in the open stance
This is an updated version of an article that originally appeared on the Ontario Curling Council website on 4 October 2017. This is joint work with John Newhook of Dalhousie University. We would like to thank Fraser Reid, former Canadian university champion with Wilfrid Laurier University, and Paige Bown of Team Dominique Vivier, for their demonstrations of brushing in the open stance. As coaches, we ordinarily teach brushing in the open stance to novices. For novice players, the open stance is considerably safer than alternative tactics. In the open stance, the player faces the skip while brushing and the feet are both facing forward, making the open stance much easier to learn for beginning players. Karlee Burgess and brushing partner Emily Zacharias brush a draw during the 2023 Manitoba provincial playdowns. Both athletes are in the closed stance. Photo credit: Connie Laliberte. Before ‘Broomgate’ in 2015, the Rules of Curling stipulated that any brushing motion had to take place fully
The importance of the preshot routine
This article was originally published on 23 March 2016 on the Ontario Curling Council website. Last week, during my own club game, I was reminded in the 3rd end why a preshot routine is critical to a sound curling delivery. With my first stone of the 3rd end, I became distracted while cleaning my stone. Then, rather than placing the stone precisely in front of my hack foot with the correct handle orientation, I had left it straddling the center line. Then I got in the hack as usual, but with the stone in the wrong place. I recall thinking that this wasn’t feeling right, but no matter, I’d throw it anyway rather than stand up and start over. Big mistake. Without completing my preshot routine as usual, I simply wasn’t ready to throw. Predictably, I missed. Consistency and the preshot routine In way that’s very similar to golf, adhering to preshot routine in curling is essential for competitive play.