How It Works: Curling, a strategy game sometimes called "chess on ice," will be a medal sport for the first time at Nagano.
It gets its name from the "curl," or spin, a player puts on the
stone by twisting it upon its release.
Each team has four players: lead, second, third and the team
captain, called the skip. Each player, alternating with the
opposing team, delivers a stone from the delivery zone toward
the house, or scoring area, as instructed by the skip. The player
must release the stone before reaching the "hog line."
Two sweepers brush the ice in front of the moving stone, trying
to maneuver the stone as close as possible to where the skip
indicates. Vigorous sweeping polishes the ice, enabling the
stone to travel as much as 15 feet farther.
The team that wins an "end," or group of 16 stones, plays first
in the next end. Often the most important stone is the last, so
teams often intentionally lose an end to reverse the order of
play.
Each game lasts about 2½ hours.
