Curling in 1511: The Stirling Stone

Twenty kilograms of Scottish granite, a sheet of pebbled ice, and a game that is almost always decided by the final stone. About 1.5 million registered curlers, spread across more than 70 national associations World Curling, founded in 1966 as the International Curling Federation; 74 member associations

45.72 m long and up to 5 m wide; the house is 3.66 m (12 feet) across, with hog lines 21 feet from each tee line Polished granite, 17.24 to 19.96 kg, maximum circumference 91.4 cm; most of it quarried on Ailsa Craig, Scotland Full medal sport since Nagano 1998; also contested at the first Winter Games in Chamonix in 1924

Canada leads with 36 men's and 19 women's; Niklas Edin holds the individual record with 8 (2013-2026) Curling looks like the gentlest thing on ice until you understand what is actually being asked. A player pushes out of a rubber foothold called the hack, releases a 20-kilogram block of polished granite before his hand crosses a line ten metres down the ice, then expects it to keep travelling another 28 metres and stop within a few centimetres of a target the size of a dinner plate, while two teammates scrub the ice ahead of it to steal back the last metre. Eight stones a side, ten ends, only one team scoring in each end. The whole sport is a negotiation between physics you cannot fully control and geometry you can.