- Hi, I'm Matt.

- And I'm Nicole.

- And we're here at the Albany Curling Club.

- [Nicole] Where we're going to give curling a shot.

Like a toss or something or a throw.

- [Matt] Yeah, we're going to throw some stones.

- [Nicole] We're going to throw some stones.

- Let's go.

- Let's go.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) - Curling is this amazing sport where it's not just it's stones on ice.

It's that fun sport where the stones slide down and the people sweep and everybody asks you, "Do you do your sweep?"

"Do you do this?"

You kind of do everything.

But it's really a game about strategy and about skill with a lot of social camaraderie.

It's a great way to kind of interact with your friends, people of all ages.

It's a really inclusive and friendly sport.

So today we're going to teach a great lesson.

We're going to teach you about the equipment.

We're going to show you the stones.

We're going to show you how to deliver a stone.

We're going to teach you how to sweep, and then we're going to play a short little game where you're going to get to throw some stones.

We're going to have a few members come in and we're going to play a short competitive game.

- Wow.

- Hi, come on in.

Your names are?

- [Matt] I'm Matt.

- Matt, nice to meet you.

- [Nicole] I'm Nicole.

- Nicole, how you doing?

- Good.

- So curling, as you hopefully know, is played on a sheet of ice.

This is the ice.

The grippers you're wearing on your shoes allow you to walk around in this ice comfortably.

So what I'd like you to do is with your broom, your curling broom that you have, pad tied down, step onto the ice with your dominant foot first.

Nice and slow.

- This foot.

- Yep.

And then the other foot.

And just stand there and let that rubber cool down for just a little bit.

We don't want, like, if it's a little warm, the ice can get a little slippery.

But just for a few minutes and then after that, you should be able to walk around comfortably.

Now that is not to say we want you running around and like doing aerobics or anything but it is safe to walk around if you're- - [Nicole] All right.

- If you're just a little careful.

We want you to crouch straight down.

Always keep this foot flat.

The foot that's on the piece of plastic, keep it flat.

And for now, your weight is still very largely on this, on the foot that's in the hack.

Step one, hips up, that's it.

Step two, rocking foot come back and the slider comes or the stabilizer comes back a little bit also.

Step three, you just extend into a lunge.

- [Nicole] Wow.

- That's it.

Your foot's not leaving the hack, nothing.

- [Nicole] Very impressive.

- Put your hands down, bring your knee up and step off the slider very slowly.

- [Nicole] Okay.

Get rid of the slider before you stand up.

- And then take the slider up.

Hand it to me, next person.

(upbeat music) You just did a curling thing.

- Woo.

- That is nice and slow.

Rock and slider back.

A little bit more.

Okay.

(Nicole cheering) - [Stu] Good job.

Come on, Nicole - Whoa, mama.

(upbeat music) - Really good at it.

Let's do that.

- That was good.

I think.

- [Stu] Very good.

All right, one more each way.

- [Nicole] Wow.

(upbeat music) Whoa.

- That was good.

Okay, sweeping does two things to the rock, actually, well, it does three things overall.

The first is it'll make it go farther.

Like you're melting the ice just a tiny bit when you're sweeping and it reduces the friction and it makes the rock go a little bit farther.

The rings here are 12 feet wide.

Two, like Olympic level sweepers can probably add 12 to 14 feet to a shot.

- Wow.

- That's a lot.

That is a lot of error tolerance.

- That'd get me almost to the middle.

- It also can alter the path of the rock a little bit.

You can keep as effectively, keep it straighter or delaying the curl because again, you're reducing the friction.

And the third thing that it's going to do is it's going to keep you warm.

- Yeah.

- Brooms are off the ice, you're not sweeping yet.

You're listening, you're listening.

- [Jenifer] Sweep.

- There you go.

- [Jenifer] Up.

- Keep going.

- This rock's still going.

- [Jenifer] Skip.

- Skips change their minds all the time.

- [Jenifer] More.

- Okay, hey, you did it.

You got the rock where it's supposed to go.

We're going to play like a little one end game and I'll show you where to stand for your first shots, we'll have a lot of club members that will help you as we're going.

- Awesome.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) Oh my God, yeah.

(upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues) (everyone speaking simultaneously) - Oh, well that was a lot of fun.

Did you have fun?

- I did have fun.

- [Matt] Okay.

- We earned our pins, we traded pins.

We need to go get some pins to trade, but this is very neat, we were honored.

- Yeah.

- But now we heard that there's a little tradition in curling that the winner has to buy the loser a drink.

- It's going to be top shelf.

Well, thank you guys so much for joining us on this episode of "Field Trip."

- And let us know where you think we should go next.

- We should go next.

Hi, I'm Matt.

Hi, I'm Matt.

- And I'm Nicole.

- And we're here.

Three, two.

(laughs) Hi, I'm Matt.

- And I'm Nicole.

- And we're here at the Albany Curling Club.

- Where we're going to give curling a shot.

Car.

I had a lot of fun and I won.

- Of course she did.

(both laughing)