Delivery
Developing more precision in your curling game
In this second article of his two-post series, guest contributor Maurice Wilson outlines practice elements to help athletes develop their finesse game. A version of this material was previously published on the Ontario Curling Council website. Addition by subtraction In Part One of this article we discussed the merits of leg drive and arm extension in the pursuit of improving precision in our finesse game. Part Two will focus on the practice techniques that can and will enhance that learning process. The same equipment may be used for all of the drills discussed in this document: speed traps, clock, iPad, RockHawk timers, and pylons as well as the charts to record data that I will provide. The length of the practice will depend on the ability, expertise and attention spans of your athletes. I have had sessions from 30 minutes to four hours in length and with productive results. The key to all successful training sessions is pace and of
Developing precision in your curling game
This guest article by Ontario’s Maurice Wilson is the first of a two-part series on delivery mechanics and mastering weight control. Portions of these two articles were previously published on the former Ontario Curling Council website. Hit for show, draw for $$ Today’s curling champions must have a complete array of skills, but first and foremost in that composite there must be great draw weight, or at the very least a world class finesse game. This skill development begins with acquiring accuracy through practice, but is refined by the advancement of precision in the finesse skills. In this context, accuracy refers to the proximity of a measurement to the true value of quantity, while precision refers to the proximity of several measurements to each other. So in curling terms, placing three shots in row on the button (that is the target) exhibits both good accuracy and good precision. However, three rocks left in the back four-foot when the target is
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 variables), ice conditions (the coefficient
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.
Setup – The importance of the slide foot position
This article is joint work with John Newhook of Dalhousie University. Routinely, one of the delivery elements we encounter frequently with young athletes is the inconsistent placement of their slide foot when in the setup position prior to beginning the delivery. In the delivery it is critical that the slide foot be positioned in a heel-toe orientation relative to the hack foot so as to permit the athlete to squat without twisting their hips, which leads to a multitude of potential problems that must be “fixed” in order to release the stone correctly on the line of delivery. This article (click on the image at right to open the PDF), originally written in 2014, documents the effects of a misplaced slide foot in the setup position. We are grateful to former Wilfrid Laurier varisty athlete Evie Fortier of Ottawa who acted as our model for the photographs included in the article. To better illustrate the issues that can occur with
Blocked, Distributed, and Random Practice as it Relates to Skill Acquisition in Curling
This article originally appeared on the Wilfrid Laurier Golden Hawks High-Performance website on 27 February 2012. An age-old question in sport is what practice structure yields the best results in relation to effective skill acquisition. This article will define three different practice structures that are referred to as Blocked, Distributed and Random. The answer to this question is critical to all coaches, as they need to structure practices appropriately by selecting technical development drills that are appropriate given the biomotor capabilities of the athletes they are working with, as well as considering such mitigating factors as experience and degree of neuromuscular development. These elements, as well as others, all must be woven into the appropriate tapestry that will lay the foundation for elite athlete development. Blocked Practice refers to practice where one skill is worked on at a time. This skill is worked on until a predetermined level of competence is acquired, and then the coach and athlete move on to the