The Bolt

I talked with our second just after the game, and I mentioned to him that I knew we were going to win this game. I said I knew it because I thought they lost before they ever stepped on the ice. They beat themselves, and it was all psychological.

He thought about it for a bit, and you could see the light go on in his head. "Yes, you're right. They went into this game thinking that they were going to lose. That's pretty clear now."

There were a few clues that tipped me off, some a little more subtle than others. First, the biggest clue (which wasn't subtle at all) was that their lead has asked me on two previous occasions, "who are you going to beat down tonight?" The first time I thought it was just a little joke from us winning a previous game. However, the second time he asked, I knew that there was something deeper going on. He actually believed that we were going to win regardless of what team we were playing. (Of course that isn't true... our record is pretty good, but far from perfect.)

Secondly, their demeanor coming onto the ice was not lively and jovial. They weren't cracking little jokes and chatting politely with us just before the game started. They were quite quiet... and I know that when I'm up against a team that I think is better than us, I'm focusing on the game and I'm not in the mood to joke around with them. I'm trying to mentally prepare myself for the upcoming battle on the ice.

Third, their skip was mis-reading the ice. He was not confident on where to put the broom down, and they did end up wrecking on a few guards. Usually when skips aren't reading the ice well, it simply comes down to a matter of confidence, and if the skip is starting the game with doubts and fears, then he's just not going to be able to pull it together.

Fourth, their skip and the rest of their team were debating about far too many shots. A skip doesn't mind a little input into the decision process, but when it happens too often, then his confidence is further eroded: it's obvious that the rest of the team isn't trusting his judgment.

Fifth, and lastly, their sweepers were having a real rough time judging the weight. They would under-sweep rocks that needed sweeping for line (which is related to mis-judging the ice mentioned above), and they would over-sweep draws that should have been left alone. They were not confident in their abilities either.

Overall, this leads to a team that is fighting with itself, and simply not performing. They came onto the ice ready to lose, and they got what they were expecting.

I talked with a curling coach about this, and he said he's seen this many times when very good club-level curling teams first play in a serious, competitive bonspiel, against teams that they have previously been admiring. The club team just falls apart, because they come into the game knowing that their opposition is very good, and they just don't think that they can win against them. They expect to lose.

If you're interested more in the mental aspects of curling, I would recommend picking up a copy of Smart Curling by Vera Pezer. With her rich history in the game of curling, combined with her accreditation and experience in the field of psychology, I think she's done a great job with this book.

As a matter of interest, here is how the game went:

END 1:
They have hammer. We come in to top four with our first rock, and they completely miss taking it out. We drop a perfect guard up in front of it, and they accidentally throw up a guard as well. We bury a second rock under cover. At this point they switch to defensive mode trying to cut us down, and can't do it: we end up stealing three.

END 2:
They still have hammer. Again we come into the top four. This time the skip changes his plan and calls for a freeze. They are short on the freeze, so we hit it out and roll over to guard shot rock. Again they are forced to go into defensive mode and chase us all the way until skip rocks. They fail, and end up giving us another three.

END 3:
They are now down 6 to 0 - panic is rapidly setting in. We again draw to the top four (I'm getting quite used to this by now!) and instead of just attempting to go for a guaranteed 2 points, their skip again changes strategy and attempts to set up a big end. So he throws up a guard. We draw the button, and he throws up another guard. We are happy to participate in this little guarding game, and we stagger a guard over his two. Now we're lying two under cover, and the skip realizes that he's again in the exact situation as the last two ends! We steal two.

END 4:
They are down 8 to 0, and have pretty much given up. I thought that perhaps our skip would change strategy and switch to a hitting game, but no he didn't. We draw the top four. The other skip is out of ideas now and looks down to the team. They indicate they want a freeze again. This time they make the freeze - but no matter, since we're still shot. We guard - that was easy. They then attempt to pick our shot rock off the button, but can't do it since the skip doesn't know where to put the broom for a bumper weight hit. We guard again.

This time the other skip does not switch to defense, but keeps drawing in. This is a bit of a mistake, since they've been throwing only hits for the last three ends. Their draws end up either light and turn into guards, or two feet heavy and turn into backing. In the mean time, we've moved shot rocks around a bit, and they no longer have their freeze in place.

After skip's first rocks, we end up lying shot and second shot with a huge mess up front and a large amount of backing - almost every rock is in play. For our skip's last shot, while we're lying two buried, we could have simply guarded the side and prevented them from drawing - but no, our skip wants to play back four weight and come off one of their rocks on the outside top four, so that we're lying three deeply buried. I asked why he was playing this shot, and he grinned: "because I'm a greedy bastard!" Our third and I nearly pissed ourselves laughing.

We made the shot and ended up covering the pin so their skip had only one shot available... he needed to throw back line weight, and come off one of their own rocks to knock ours off the pin. This would be a shot for one. He missed it, again due to giving the wrong amount of ice, and ended up crashing on the mess of guards. We steal three more.

After four ends, the score was 11 to 0, and the other team quit playing. But they didn't give up - they had already done that before stepping onto the ice.