Page 3.2

BRUSHING equip. cont.--Pole length and brushing position for efficiency:

Note student (in fig. 3.4) is pressing on a bathroom scale.

He is applying 30lbs. to the scale. The boy weighs 100lbs.

He says he is straining back and ham string muscles with the wide stance brushing technique.

Stomach muscles are also tight. Back muscles feel like they are in a twist.

Arm muscles try to counter balance outward weight shift.

Brushing back and forth "pulls" arms and every other muscle harder and makes it difficult to brush with high cycles.

Extra weight is applied to the toes in the counter balancing mode.

To make a long story short. You are working "heck" out of the body while doing Fig. 3.4 a poor brushing job!

NOW. Note student in the upright position on broom. THE EFFICIENT POSITION.

The factory 4' length brush is JUST long enough for the boy's 4'-6" height. Factory brushes are too short for ladies 5'- 0" tall

The brush just sticks up past the arm pit to the back/shoulder muscle.

The body can "help" control the brush with large back muscles.

The pole is not poking and rubbing the arm pit. You will notice some European curlers using a padded top piece to be able to push down harder utilizing the arm pit.

I have noticed that their pole is too short and they stand back too far nullifying most of the apparent hard work they are applying.

Also note that boy has a hole in the knee of his jeans. Probably the result of his praying too much and his dad spent all their money on curling and can't afford new ones.

Fig 3.5 WHY BRUSH AT ALL?

Why do we want to brush?

Just to give our skip an opportunity to vent his frustrations by yelling at us?

Well maybe, but more likely we "feel" we are helping our team by making that dumb rock scoot further down the sheet.

Proper brushing can be as important as skip rocks.

Brushing cleans the rock's travel path.

Some brushes are adept at picking up lint, brush hairs, and water impurities.

We are "sweeping" away larger broken pebble tops. Pebble is broken by rocks and by sharp slider edges. Sliders are not manufactured with a round edge and help cause early pebble flattening failure.

Brushing's most important job is to crush ice crystals. A soft "faced" brush holds and grinds large crystals into fine crystals so the rock will slide easier.

It may be possible that the crystal lattice structure of ice is momentarily bent flat reducing friction between the rock ice coated surface and the sheet ice.

Hard brushes can shear uneven pebble tops which is not good except in the first two ends.

Soft Brushes polish the tops with the fine crushed crystals carried in the soft cover (not hard nylon).

Small crystals are formed by the rubbing together of large crystals collected in the fabric under"soft brushes."

It is important the large "rock grabbing" crystals in the "valleys" between pebble are crushed as well.

The rock also rides in the valleys between pebble. The up and down motion can be heard by the clicking/vibration sound as the rock slides down the sheet. Look in the technical section- chapter "ice."