Curling

How It's Played

Curling can be looked at as lawn bowling on ice. The playing area, or "rink," is 46 yards long and 14 feet wide. At each end is a house, 12 feet in diameter. A mark called the button or tee in the center of the house is surrounded by concentric circles. The circles simply make it easier to judge distances; they have no effect on scoring.

Instead of rolling balls, curlers slide round stones down the ice, attempting to get as close as possible to the button. A stone has a maximum diameter of 36 inches and a maximum weight of 44 pounds. There's a handle at the top, and the bottom is concave to reduce friction.

Teams are made up of four players, led by a captain, or "skip". Each player delivers two stones, alternating with an opponent. The unique feature of curling is that a player's teammates use brooms to sweep the ice ahead of the stone, allowing it to go farther.

After all eight players are finished, the end (or inning) is complete. A team scores one point for each stone that's nearer to the tee than any of the other team's stones. Thus, only one team can score in any given end and the number of points can range from one to eight. If there are no stones in the house, or if the closest stones from the opposing teams are the same distance from the tee, there is no scoring for that end. A match is usually made up of 10 to 12 ends.

Curling is a highly tactical sport. Knocking an opponent's stone out of scoring territory is an important part of the sport, as is protecting a teammate's stone to make it difficult for an opponent to dislodge. Expert curlers, by putting spin on a stone, can make it curve (or "curl") a considerable distance to place it behind blocking stones.

Ex. 10. Guess the sport game.

1. You have to use a special racquet to hit the ball. You must not touch the ball with your body. You don't have to hit the ball before it bounces. It can bounce once. You don't have to wear white, but many players do. You have to play in a special room. You have to hit the ball above a line on the wall.

2. You have to hit the ball with a long wooden hammer. The ball has to go into a goal. You don't need to be rich, but you have to know how to ride a horse.

3. To win this game, you have to score 21 points and still be 2 points ahead. You don't have to run very far. You have to hit the ball with a small wooden paddle. The ball must not bounce on the floor or on your side of the net except when you serve.

4. You have to be good at running. You don't need to wear any protective clothing and you must not try to hit another player. You can touch the ball with any part of your body except your hands. Only one person on each team is allowed to touch the ball with his hands—and he doesn't have to be good at running.

5. You must not touch the other players. You are allowed to touch the ball with your hands and try to throw it into the net. You can run with the ball if you bounce it with one hand.

6. You have to reach 15 points to win. You have to hit the ball over the net with your hands. If it lands out of court, the other side gets a point. You can play this game almost anywhere if you have a net—in the garden, on the beach, as well as in a gymnasium.

Ex. 11. Find all of the Olympic words below in the grid on the left.

medals bronze gold silver Olympics athlete events	ice hockey countries skeleton curling training snowboarding	figure skating bobsleigh luge speed skating long track short track	skiing alpine cross country freestyle jumping Nordic combined

Ex. 12. Try to describe your favorite game. Let your partners guess which game you are describing. Speak according to the plan that is given in the example:

Example:

1. Number of players: Two teams of eleven players each.

2. Equipment necessary: a ball

3. Place where played: a special field which has goal posts at both ends.

4. How to play and win: the players kick the ball to each other. They try to kick it between the goal posts of the opposing team.

6. Some of the rules: only the two goal-keepers are allowing to touch the ball with their hands; no one can kick or push another player.

Ex. 13. Answer the following questions. Do not answer in one sentence. Add something:

What kind of sport do you know? 2. Do you play draughts? Do you attend hockey matches? What football team do you support? 5. Did you ever try figure-skating? 6. Who usually likes tobogganing? 7. What do spectators do at the stadium? 8. Where are boat-races held? 9. What is the most popular sport in Russia? 10. Do Russian teams participate in international matches? 11. Who coaches your football team? 12. What sports and games do you know? 13. What games take the first place in public interest? 14. What is the great national sport in England?

Ex. 14. Listen and insert the missing words into the dialogues.

Loyal fans

Ted: What do you think of the game, Bill?

Bill: Dreadful! It was neither exciting nor ________.

Ted: I agree with you. Of course the weather didn’t help. They’d hardly _____ off when it started to rain.

Our team is useless in the mud, and they were off _______ away.

Bill: Some of our team can’t play ________ in either wet or dry conditions, and I’ve never seen them on

form. I can’t help laughing when I watch old Ford. Every time he gets the ball he either ______ over

or passes it to the ____________. I can’t make out why they pick him.

Ted: He’s too old really. He had already been playing in the team for about ten years when I became a

___________ – and that was eight years ago.

Bill: Evans isn’t much better. He is not only too _______ , he’s scared to tackle as well.

Ted: Yes, he is always afraid of getting injured. Neither Ford nor Evans is up to it. We need two new

defenders and a new ____________ too.

Bill: But the management is to mean to spend money either or new players or on improvement of the

ground.

Ted: Yes, that’s true. The _______ is a disgrace. It isn’t flat and the drains don’t work. Every time it rains

the pitch is covered with great puddles of water.

Bill: What we need, Ted is not only new players but a new manager and a new pitch as well. Then

perhaps we could win _______________ to the Third Division.

Ex. 15. Make up your own dialogue on the following situations:

1. Two friends are talking after a football match. One is happy – his favorite team has won; the other is not as his team has lost the match.

2. Imagine a dialogue between two sports fans about their favorite sports. Each of them is trying to prove that his kind of sports is the best.

3. It’s Sunday afternoon. In a few minutes, there will be a football match on TV, while on another channel there will be a fashion show. Argument between husband and wife.

Ex. 16. Translate the following sentences into English.

Я предпочитаю легкую атлетику боксу и борьбе. 2. Я мечтаю поставить рекорд по плаванию. 3. Сегодня я не могу бежать, я не в форме. 4. Люди во всем мире следят за Олимпийскими играми 5. Он уделяет много времени физической подготовке. 6. Я болею за футбольную команду «Спартак». 7. Наша игра закончилась вничью. 8. Он охотно будет тренировать нас в фехтовании. 9. Вы занимаетесь легкой атлетикой? 10. Виндсерфинг и дельтапланеризм появились совсем недавно. 11. Мальчик мечтает стать хоккеистом и просит купить ему клюшку и шайбу. 12. Сколько человек примут участие в институтском шахматном чемпионате? 13. Разве вы не хотели бы завоевать кубок в этом соревновании? 14. Кто первый забил гол? 15. Вы пойдете на этот матч? 16. Стрельба из лука стала достаточно популярным видом спорта. 17. Никто не ожидал, что они выиграют со счетом 2:0. 18. Ему хорошо дается фигурное катание. 19. Женщины не играют в футбол, правда? — Играют, но редко. 20. Кто завоевал первенство вашего института, по шашкам? — Один из наших первокурсников. 21. Не стоит вступать больше чем в два спортивных кружка одновременно. 22. Я предпочитаю художественную гимнастику любому другому виду спорта. 23. Мы не сможем с вами соревноваться, мы недостаточно подготовлены. 24. Вы собираетесь участвовать в соревнованиях по гребле? — Обязательно. 25. Я уверен, что игра закончится вничью. 26. У нас прекрасный зал и все возможности для хорошей физической подготовки.

Ex. 17. Listen to the texts then retell them

Ex. 18. Speaking practice

1. Theroleofsportinmodern life.

2. Olympic Games.

3. Sport game. Kind of sport.

Ex. 19. Writing practice

Write one page essay about

1. your favorite kind of sport or sport game. Write about the rules and how to play it.

2. how to be physically fit.

Supplementary reading

WHAT MAKES ALL PEOPLE KIN

People all over the world are very found of sports and games. That is one thing in which people of every nationality and class are united.

The most popular outdoor winter sports are shooting, hunting, hockey and , in the countries where the weather is frosty and there is much snow – skating, skiing and tobogganing. Some people greatly enjoy figure-skating and ski-jumping.

Summer affords excellent opportunities for swimming, boating, yachting, cycling, gliding and many other sports. Among outdoor games football takes the first place in public interest; this game is played in all the countries of the world. The other games that have firmly established themselves in favor in different countries are golf, lawn-tennis, cricket, volley-ball, basketball, and so on. Badminton is also very popular.

All the year round many people include in boxing, wrestling, athletics, gymnastics and track and field events. Scores of young girls and women go in for callisthenics.

Among indoor games the most popular are billiards, table tennis, draughts and some others, but the great international game is chess, of course. The results of chess tournaments are studied and discussed by thousands of enthusiasts in different countries.

So we can say that sport is one of the things that makes all people kin.

THE FOOT-RACE

It is the oldest contest that took place in Olympia. Until the 13th Olympiad (728 B.C.) when the games lasted for only one day, it was the only event at the sanctuary. The athletes were running nude, in an area whose length was determined at 600 feet (192.27m), that is one Stade. It was this distance that gave its name to the area used for the performance of the event. These areas, the stadiums, were situated on hillsides or in small valleys, thus enabling the spectators to follow the events. Later and as the crowd of spectators grew, artificial slopes were built and the spectators sat on the ground.

The stadium at Olympia had a capacity of 45,000 spectators. Only men were allowed to watch the games with the exception of the high priestess of Demeter Chamyne. The start and duration of the stadium race were specified by clear rules and there were set penalties for athletes who broke them. The rules were clear for all the events and for the duration of the games there were specific bodies, the Alytai, who kept the order in all the areas of performance. The judges and those in charge of the games were the Hellondikai, who at first were life members but then appointed by lot from the Elean citizens.

There are no records of the achievements of the athletes during archaic times as there were no means of the keeping of time. What was important was to be the first amongst the other athletes of the event, and receive the honour and the glory that followed such a distinction.

Also taking place in Olympia there were the Heraia, athletic games for women in which young girls from Elis partook. These games were held every four years independently of the Olympic games. The women ran wearing their hair loose, dressed in short tunics.