Are you enjoying watching curling at the Sochi Olympics? Are you intrigued by the game and want to learn more?  Would you like to try it out yourself?

The great news is that you CAN try it this Sunday, February 16, from 12-5pm, and then again on Thursday, February 20, from 6-9pm.

The great folks down at the Petersham Curling Club (PCC), about 45 minutes south of Keene, are holding two FREE open houses to help people learn about the game.  As noted on their page about the curling open houses, the two upcoming dates are:

• Sun, Feb 16, 12-5 pm – At this Open House you’ll have a chance to actually try the sport of curling.  You’ll learn how to deliver a stone, the role of sweeping and more. This will be a great opportunity to get on the ice and experience the sport yourself!
• Thurs, Feb 20, 6-9 pm – This will be a week-night version of the Feb 16th Open House where you will again get a chance to try out the sport of curling.

All you need to bring is a pair of clean, rubber-soled shoes and your enthusiasm!  You’ll have the chance to try out the great game of curling that you are seeing on the Olympics.

It’s easy to get to the Petersham Curling Club – from Keene just head south on Route 32 (going down past the Keene airport) and stay on Route 32 all the way down through Richmond, NH, Royalston, MA, Athol and on into Petersham.  The club is located right off of Route 32. More information can be found on the PCC directions page. In good weather it takes about 45 minutes to get from Keene down to the Petersham club.

The Petersham Curling Club is a great place to curl and is where several of us involved with starting up the Monadnock Curling Club all curl.  We strongly encourage you to head down to Petersham, MA, and check out the Open Houses.  And if the curling bug bites you as it has us, please do join the PCC and start playing the awesome sport of curling!

And then…  please let us know you are interested in seeing curling come to Keene!

Wow! I had no idea that the amazing “Scotties Tournament of Hearts” was happening this year so close to us up in Montreal, Quebec!

From Saturday, February 1, 2014, through Sunday, February 9, you’ll have the opportunity to watch some of the best women’s curling teams out there competing in this annual Canadian curling championship. Given the Canadian love of curling, the competition is fierce and so the teams that make it into the “Scotties” play at an unbelievable level of the sport. They typically make shots that I could only dream of someday making!

Alas, I don’t think that I’ll be able to make it up to Montreal this year, but if you can it would be an amazing experience to see these curling teams in action!  No news on their site or their Facebook page about a live video stream but perhaps we’ll see more about that closer to the time of the event.

We have an amazing opportunity this weekend (Jan 17-19) to watch some of the best curling teams in the world competing against each other in the “Continental Cup” in Las Vegas.  All of it will be streamed LIVE across the Internet at:

http://www.youtube.com/worldcurlingtv

The Continental Cup is a unique format that pits 6 US and Canadian teams in “Team North America” against 6 teams in “Team World” from Scotland, Sweden, Japan and Norway.  In contrast to most other curling events that are a series of regular team games, the Continental Cup has team games, singles games, mixed doubles games and ‘skins’ games.  The scoring is explained on the event web site.

The remaining games that will be live streamed are (all times US Eastern):

Friday 10 PM – Team
Saturday 12 PM – Mixed Doubles
Saturday 4:30 PM – Team
Saturday 9:30 PM – Team
Sunday 4 PM – Skins
Sunday 9 PM – Skins

According to the US Curling Association web site, NBC Sports Network will also televise two of the Saturday games… although they will be broadcast on Sunday.   

The World Curling TV stream on YouTube will be streaming live, of course, and will probably be the best place to see all the action.  It should be some outstanding curling so do check it out!