not that anyone has said so to me recently --

-- but for those who maintain that curling isn't a sport? i was thinking about this yesterday as i lay in bed and ached.

the ice sheet is 142 feet long. for six of each eight rocks thrown, the front end (lead and second) stay with the thing most of the way down, even if they're not sweeping; call that 135 feet, on average, usually at a trot, and then walking back. (when they do sweep, that's an added aerobic workout like you have no idea.)

by my calculations, then, in an eight-end game, the front end covers 12960 feet, or just under two and a half miles, and half of that on the run. (the vice only sweeps four rocks, for almost a mile and two-thirds. the skip, that lazy bum, doesn't sweep at all.) it's not basketball or soccer, but i'm going to guess that's more running than your average baseball player does in a day's work.

anyone who wishes to have fraser or turnbull point this out to ray kowalski is welcome to quote me. :-)

last curling post of the day:

my broom is here!

[backflip]

i went, for those of you who care, with the thin-handle straight-angle brownie brush, with a grey head. i also got a regular-weight broom bag (which will, incidentally, comfortably hold at least one more broom as well as one or two people's worth of gear).

[backflip]