I think the Market for kurling stones isn't really large enough that they can gouge prices too heavily despite having a supply monopoly. There maybe 20 countries in the world at most that have regular kurling tournaments. People just won't bother getting into the games if they make it too expensive.
@C22772 Yes they would. But they wouldn't be the first sport to switch out traditional materials for cheaper materials that can be more easily sourced and manufactured. They'd probably even be one of the last.
I passed stones once; but the doctors informed me that it was a common medical condition and not a game. As an American, it also cost me $600 per stone.
As an American you should have just pissed them out. We arnt Canadians. We don't play around with our stones like it some kind of game kojo. Edit M cope is the coldest mother fucker on the Internet
They're called "Cheeses" because they literally look like a big block o' cheese Also something something English cheesewheel-tumbling-down-a-hill competition
The thing is these things can't be compared to a hocket stick because youre not buying stones lol. Everyone thinks they need to own their own personal stones. Actually they are part of the venue. You rent the ice rink and the stones. Not every player is transporting 16 heavy ass stones out of their car to practice lol. Just the thought of it is funny lol. Basically you have a 10 million dollar curling ice rink and the operators have to spend $9600 on a set of stones. I don't think they even care. Its a rounding error on their balance sheet. Its the cheapest part of the arena lol. These things last 10+ years so they can rent you the arena and the stones for like $20 per person and thats literally the business. Its not expensive at all. Its probably more than $20 now. I haven't been in a long time.
Pffft, I have multiple rocks in my backyard that have lasted for millions of years. (I can handcraft them into a shape and sell them to you for a few mil)
My wife loves to watch curling, so I got a group of friends together to try curling once for her birthday. The club did a great job of teaching us the basics, and then they turned us loose. They also had a dozen barrels of beer stacked along the side of the ice. The instructor said curling is the only Olympic game that's played inside a walk-in beer cooler.
I worked with the company for three years, and unfortunately was one of the people who had to be let go at the beginning of the pandemic. I can safely say that the price of the stone is a bargain for the time, effort and craftsmanship that goes into not only making, but every stage of the process. From Ailsa Craig to the finished product, it certainly takes a momentous effort and quality from the team to make the stone as "perfect" as it currently is!
@smoothcriminal7118 Because the taboo surrounding pay is entirely made up by rich business owners to hide the fact that they underpay many of their employees? There's nothing wrong with discussing pay.
@Whoami691 in germany we also have the saying „you shall not speak about money“ id agree on saying that its culturally dependant but not only in the US
I remember watching curling for the first time and thought “what the hell am I watching”… by the end of the event my whole work department were glued to the TV xD
It is also spreading around the world, watched Canada play Turkiye, Japan, New Zealand and tomorrow Korea at the women's world championships just the last 2 days.
I worked with the company for three years, and unfortunately was one of the people who had to be let go at the beginning of the pandemic. I can safely say that the price of the stone is a bargain for the time, effort and craftsmanship that goes into not only making, but every stage of the process. From Ailsa Craig to the finished product, it certainly takes a momentous effort and quality from the team to make the stone as "perfect" as it currently is!
To other people, curling is a boring sport. To me, I love it, it's parents putting their sweeping skills to the test. It’s one of my go-to sports on Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games. It's great to see curling embrace its Scottish roots like the Olympics using stones made from authentic Scottish granite, the British curling team always having Scots, and bagpipes played before the beginning of each session as part of ancient tradition. I'm not Scottish myself, but it doesn't take long to see why Scottish culture is appreciated so much, it's too cool not to like!
-Handmade curling stones made out of rare granite. - The stones come from one island in the world. -You have to ship to these stones to someone in the mainland by boat to make the curling stones. -They only cost $600?! That’s an insanely reasonable price.
@Davisrullzs And people pay Thousands to millions on smaller but shinier rocks that are surprisingly common as well aka Diamonds. Remember De Beers get Diamonds by truckload but only release a fraction of it to keep the "value" high.
Ngl, $600 sounds like an incredible deal for a big, heavy work of art painstakingly and precisely made by a skilled artisan out of rare stone harvested from a remote island…
You can get exactly the same quality stones from other places. But the monopolists invented that whole bs story that you can get the stones only from that faraway island and bla bla bla
I had never heard of curling until sitting at my pub and the winter olympics were on the tele. The volume was turned down but I noticed many people focused on it. All the sudden they all erupted in cheering and it was a jump scare like no other. Then someone explained the game to me and by the fourth match I was hooked. Been following it every since and it's my number one sport at the winter olympics
People think it's a difficult sport to understand, when it's quite the opposite. I usually tell people, when getting into a new sport...just worry about how to score The rest you will pick up over time.
I grew up in the 60's and 70's in Northern Ohio. One of the broadcast TV stations we could get was CLKW from Detroit/Windsor. They had Curling on sometimes on the weekends, so I remember it from then. Always seemed fascinating to me. I'm glad it is going strong.
Quarrying*. Though you’re quite correct in your statement. They’re obviously trying to upsell themselves to appeal to the Brown Rice & Sandals Brigade, as my good aunt calls them. Rampant pssing vegans I calls ‘em 😀😀
I can honestly say that I have never in my life thought that the hand manufacturing of curling stones is even a thing or that one company taking granite from one island has lease over the Olympic Games! You know, every once in a while you come across a completely random nugget of information that just shocks you not only with how incredibly unique it is but with the notion of how unlikely it is that you would have ever pondered it yourself to the point where you might have looked it up online or something online. So, in other words, I probably would have gone my entire life completely oblivious to this process or this company or the history behind this unless I saw this video today. This is very cool and I am delighted to have come across this video!!!
A few years back I remember I stumbled upon and enjoyed watching the Russian woman's curling team play. Then I figured out that the brooms and a players actually had an effect on the play and started to enjoy the game.
I have no idea why, but this sport caught me when I was a young child watching it at the Olympics and 30 years later, it's still the only sport I watch during the Olympics.
I'm curious as to how the sport was invented in the first place and how these rocks were discovered and determined to be the best option to use considering their rarity in the world.
When I saw the title I thought that the stones would cost like 15~20k each. $600 seems like a really reasonable price considering it's pure granite and it can last for decades
Yeah but the olympics last a few weeks and then move to another country. So they get to sell a new tournaments worth minimum every 4 years. Pretty sure they love making those stones because they bribed the olympics committee into having a monopoly. I don't believe for a second they are the only people capable of making them, or their super special granite is the only material that can be used. Its just corruption hiding behind a mask of snooty pretention.
Curling was so fun back when I lived in Alaska. But it was so hard and I was rather crap. Can't believe how much goes into being a good curler, and I appreciate watching the games so much more now
The women's worlds are on now. If you watch closely there are now 2 sweepers but only one sweeps most of the time, one type of broom cuts the ice to add more curl for the rock to grip, and the other polishes the ice to let the rock slide and run straighter. The sweepers can carry a rock up to 12 feet and can swing it side to side as much as 6 feet. The throw, and spin added to the handle can also create many different swing paths. It takes enormous skill and strategy to be even a decent player, plus strength and endless cardio.
The Trefor quarry mentioned at 5.43 was founded by my family. My grandfather Huw Darbishire was the General Manager for a time and the post was taken over by his brother Stephen Darbishire until the quarry was bought by Bath and Portland Stone. I have a photograph of my mother drilling a boulder with an Holman Silver 3 drilling machine sometime in the early 50's so that it could be split into smaller pieces. I spent many happy days there as a boy watching all the many facets of the production of granite for memorial stones, curling stones and road chippings.
Honestly I feel like $600 for one is actually a pretty good deal. That's what good manufacturing costs these days, if it were made by automated robot machines in China and not by hand then sure charge $150 for it, or cost plus 20% or so. Sure in that case cost is lower, but this is hand made by the exact same artisans every time - a monopoly, and I think given that, the price is fair.
Repent and believe in Jesus Christ go away, stop trying to spread religion to give attention to your youtube channel for personal gain. You're no different than crypto scammers.
reminder that machines are more precise AND faster than these same artisans in question, so, with the proper adjustments, settings, and materials, those "150$" "made by automated robot machines in China" curling stones would be MORE consistent than these ones, since they'd be made in indistinguishably identical movements
@a_lexine measurement-wise they may be more consistent than those made by an artisan. However, as any mason would tell you, when cutting rock a machine can cause fractures for seemingly no reason. That's why it's better to leave it to people because they can prevent these from happening.
Seems like a scam. There should just be specific demensions and weight and bouncyness. İt shouldnt have to come from a specific quarry. Should be made like poolballs or bowling balls.
There is usually 4 sheets with two sets each, coming to 64 rocks (usually they have two sets of spares too, but I won’t count them) meaning the total cost is just under $40,000.
@PanduPoluan The World Curling federation has a few sets of stones dedicated to international play. I’d be surprised if they’ve even ordered new ones in the past decade.
I'm surprised these guys have been producing stones for so long. like, it's amazing that there is still a demand for stones that are simply eternal after their manufacture. what athletes do with them, that they need new stones? it's a damn stone that slides on ice, its bottom can't wear out
The stones wear out after a lot of play. The striking edge (the part that hits the other stones) gets thicker and thicker after lots of play and eventually the stones don't bounce off each other very well and can't be played with (on Olympic or championship level)
They are resurfaced/scuffed each day of play, and are replaced quite frequently in competition. Most sets of stones only are used competitively for a year, maybe 2.
For me this video takes the exclusive credit for the discovery of an interesting sport coming from a people as nice and culturally rooted as the Scottish. I'll definitely watch out for the upcoming world curling competition.
sounds like something that Finland would do xP Wife Carrying and Phone Throwing and all kinds of weird 'national sports' - i wouldn't be surprised if there was asock throwing contest
wtf I’ve literally never watched any curling before, i dont even know how it works or what the rules are, but i still watched the entire thing and found it pretty interesting
Six hundred dollars? I was expecting somewhere between $1,000 and $2,000, considering the logistics, extraordinary quality, and craftsmanship involved in these beautiful works of art 🎨
@badmaniak Can you cut stone like that? You say that as if Stonecutting is an easy craft that doesn't involve hours of hard work and training to pull off.
This business was for sale 2 years ago. Family run for 50 years, 4 employees. Turnover £180 a year. Purchase price was £160k. I looked at it, but then a friends brother in law bought it. Since then has grown the business. The Olympiad buys new sets for all teams every 4 years. The national teams also buys their own for training etc, as do aspiring individual players. The club scene is also growing since the last Olympics. It’s a healthy niche business based on artisan skills and local source on Ailsa Craig. There is a second site in Canada that can source the right quality granite. These are only two globally, so it is exclusive. There are considerable costs to mining and transportation from island and then machinery to make stones, with great skills needed. It’s a good little business. They are branching out into hi fi stand and granite plant pot stands with the off cuts.
Nothing feels more Canadian to me than being in a small prairie town where they only have a few hundred people but they have a curling club and a hockey arena 🙂
I'd found out about these earlier thanks to an excellent article on BBC Travel! Glad to see it covered, although in an event as big as the Olympics, $600 feels "relatively" cheap (compared to the other stuff in the series)
Wow I’ve seen that island before while I was on a ferry from Northern Ireland to Scotland to watch a football match when I was a kid and years later I’ve found out it has a interesting story😂 the island even looks kinda like a curly stone
That's depending on the curl that the player uses when "throwing the stone". If the density of the rock is not even, or more dense to 1 side, the curl will veer off either right or left. Hard, into the side of the sheet, or off it's proposed path set by the player. In all probability, eliminating the stone from play before it reaches the destination down the ice.
The players are so well practiced that they can tell which stones will perform in which ways, and choose which to use to accentuate their ability. The worst is having to use 2 stones that are not evenly matched.
At least in Canada most cities have at least 2 or 3 curling clubs, Toronto and Montreal have 10+. With something like 5+ sheets of ice per club. Each sheet needs 16 stones. Do the math and that's quite a lot of stones. The stones don't last forever, they need to be replaced when they get worn out. Then add the Olympics every 4 years and clubs in other counties and I think there's enough demand
For those calling it lame, apply that same logic to EVERY other sport: - Throwing a ball back and forth and some tackling...and call it American football - Cars going in circles...racing - Catching and batting a ball and throw in some adults scramming to snatch balls from children...baseball - hitting a puck back and forth...ice hockey The point is not all sports are for everyone. People can enjoy curling while others can enjoy ice hockey. What happened to COEXISTING?
Read "26 photos show how some Olympic venues are left abandoned after the games end": bit.ly/3MfMhq8
Why is there a thing 4 days ago???
considering they basically monopolized the prodcution of those stones, thats a surprisingly reasonable price
I think the Market for kurling stones isn't really large enough that they can gouge prices too heavily despite having a supply monopoly. There maybe 20 countries in the world at most that have regular kurling tournaments.
People just won't bother getting into the games if they make it too expensive.
If they made it too expensive curling tournaments would find other manufacturers.
@TonkarzOfSolSystem yeah but since they were the only ones allowed to mine the island they'd have to change materials or something
Compared to my tennis or even table tennis rackets, I would say they are not that expensive. xD
@C22772 Yes they would. But they wouldn't be the first sport to switch out traditional materials for cheaper materials that can be more easily sourced and manufactured. They'd probably even be one of the last.
$600 is way less than i was expecting. No wonder so many small towns in Canada have curling rinks along with hockey rinks
That and you don’t need a $500,000+ ice resurfaced to clean the curling ice every period
@nothing2see315 Just a hoser with a backpack :D, and the clipping machine.
A bowling ball in this granit and then we are talking...
You need more than 1, though
Olympic stones. This video is about Olympic stones.
I passed stones once; but the doctors informed me that it was a common medical condition and not a game. As an American, it also cost me $600 per stone.
@flmang so did the stones they passed 💀
Lmfaooooo 😭 💀
Blue or Green ones?
As an American you should have just pissed them out. We arnt Canadians. We don't play around with our stones like it some kind of game kojo. Edit M cope is the coldest mother fucker on the Internet
Kidney stones?
Here after both men and women's teams of Canada have been accused of cheating at Winter Olympics 2026! Algorithm is wild AF.
BIG CANADIAN CHEATERS
Same and the video mentioned Canada 🤣
@russellny8086 exactly😅😆
Canadians have been cheating at this sport for decades.
@MOHerefordYeah, Swedish setup those cameras specifically to catch them.😂😂 They were fed up ig😅
When they said expensive, i was expecting a lot more than $600 dollars. The finished product is a work of art.
!!!
You need 16 stones to play. So 600*16 = 9600 dollars plus expedition price (more than 320 kilograms) and taxes means more than 10k for a single set.
600 for a stone
@nicoladc89 Ya shipping those have gotta be expensive.
Being rich must be nice eh? $600 for a shiny rock w/ a handle IS expensive. They only hiked up the price bc they know the Olympics can afford it 😂
A set of stones can last decades. So, they are expensive but a curling club isn't ordering a new set every year.
There are clubs for this senseless "sport"?!
@arthc.castillo8982 Oh but 300 pound grown ass men tackling each other is senseful? Americans...
@A_noone_Z look at all my sense!
Maybe some sports aren't done to make sense bro
@arthc.castillo8982 this is no different than any sport in the world
They're called "Cheeses" because they literally look like a big block o' cheese
Also something something English cheesewheel-tumbling-down-a-hill competition
$600 for a pure slab of granite. But $400 for a composite hockey stick.
Same with a baseball bat !
Carbon Fiber hockey stick. I didn't realize being a Professional Curler Paid so well to afford such exotic items.
The thing is these things can't be compared to a hocket stick because youre not buying stones lol. Everyone thinks they need to own their own personal stones. Actually they are part of the venue. You rent the ice rink and the stones. Not every player is transporting 16 heavy ass stones out of their car to practice lol. Just the thought of it is funny lol.
Basically you have a 10 million dollar curling ice rink and the operators have to spend $9600 on a set of stones. I don't think they even care. Its a rounding error on their balance sheet. Its the cheapest part of the arena lol. These things last 10+ years so they can rent you the arena and the stones for like $20 per person and thats literally the business. Its not expensive at all. Its probably more than $20 now. I haven't been in a long time.
NO FINGERS ON THE GRANITE!!! :)
😂😂
Lol, I was like "that's double touch girl!" 0:36
Canadian cheaters
Considering they can last for decades, and that they are handcrafted, I'd say it's worth the money
Considering you got Lateralus on your profile pic, i'd say your comment is worth a like
It's a rock!
Pffft, I have multiple rocks in my backyard that have lasted for millions of years. (I can handcraft them into a shape and sell them to you for a few mil)
@trucutru3 try it then
@trucutru3 man is so smart, man knows everything
Canada curling team recommended this video to me.
5:36 highly technical schematic
Lmaoo
😂😂😂
Jim made a triangle once and management was not pleased... This was their solution.
who’s here after boopgate lmao
Yes!
My wife loves to watch curling, so I got a group of friends together to try curling once for her birthday. The club did a great job of teaching us the basics, and then they turned us loose. They also had a dozen barrels of beer stacked along the side of the ice. The instructor said curling is the only Olympic game that's played inside a walk-in beer cooler.
I was watching it this week in the Olympics and I was surprised how interesting it was. Now I have to figure out the scoring and the strategy!
thats so dope, they gotta go on a quest to a magic island to get magic stone for their fun game
I worked with the company for three years, and unfortunately was one of the people who had to be let go at the beginning of the pandemic. I can safely say that the price of the stone is a bargain for the time, effort and craftsmanship that goes into not only making, but every stage of the process. From Ailsa Craig to the finished product, it certainly takes a momentous effort and quality from the team to make the stone as "perfect" as it currently is!
Why do they call themself "Masons"? I thought its the name of magnificient and hidden organization of politics and buisiness elite, ruling the world.
@AnotherOpinionatedIdiot why would you ask stranger about his wages?
@smoothcriminal7118 Because the taboo surrounding pay is entirely made up by rich business owners to hide the fact that they underpay many of their employees? There's nothing wrong with discussing pay.
@smoothcriminal7118 Only in America is it taboo to ask.
Because that way they can underpay you and you don't ask questions.
@Whoami691 in germany we also have the saying „you shall not speak about money“ id agree on saying that its culturally dependant but not only in the US
Wow, didn’t know they were stone. Never take learning for granite 😃
That joke is marbleous.
@Tuck-Shop It's a rock solid joke not gonna lie.
Such an igneous attempt at humus made me sedimental.
These replies rock
I’m too stoned to make sense of these puns right now
I didn't know what they were made of. I always took them for granite.
Such an underrated comment lol
U really cracked my barrel with that one
HEHEHEHAJW
😂
also this works more with american people as granite and granted are totatlly different on the A vowel in most accents, but not american.
I remember watching curling for the first time and thought “what the hell am I watching”… by the end of the event my whole work department were glued to the TV xD
I was thrilled to see that a middle age dad could be an Olympic athlete
I live in Duluth Minnesota. As world champions we love curling.
This is great that a traditional game and its dependent industry is not only able to survive, but it infact is thriving..
Thriving? The Olympic committee probably has this company by the balls.
İ don't like it. Hope they go bankrupt.
@garrysekelli6776 Even if we don't like something, that does not mean that we should pray for their mis fortunes...
It is also spreading around the world, watched Canada play Turkiye, Japan, New Zealand and tomorrow Korea at the women's world championships just the last 2 days.
I worked with the company for three years, and unfortunately was one of the people who had to be let go at the beginning of the pandemic. I can safely say that the price of the stone is a bargain for the time, effort and craftsmanship that goes into not only making, but every stage of the process. From Ailsa Craig to the finished product, it certainly takes a momentous effort and quality from the team to make the stone as "perfect" as it currently is!
Glad I'm not the only one who expected it to be way more than $600 a stone
Well as long as idiots pay to watch it you can expect any price.
I'm pretty sure the stones they're using at the Olympics cost way more than $600 each. Club stones, perhaps.
This is the type of random knowledge that I love to learn. Thanks for this
Sweden is very grateful today😁
Love from Sweden!!!
Quick answer, there expensive because the Olympics are involved
Affirmative
They’re*
OR because they are made by manual labour in an industrialized nation🙄
Theiyre're
They're
To other people, curling is a boring sport. To me, I love it, it's parents putting their sweeping skills to the test. It’s one of my go-to sports on Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games. It's great to see curling embrace its Scottish roots like the Olympics using stones made from authentic Scottish granite, the British curling team always having Scots, and bagpipes played before the beginning of each session as part of ancient tradition. I'm not Scottish myself, but it doesn't take long to see why Scottish culture is appreciated so much, it's too cool not to like!
It’s DUMB!
LOL...
Got a rock in the backyard you can shove on the ice. Riverrock bro, smooth as baby bottom 👌 annnnnd you don't have to spend money on it
I can't even call it a sport, its too lame
It's kinda lame
Answering a question I never had for a product I never thought about. Still a fascinating process. And great to see a Scottish craft still surviving.
It doesn’t have a lot these days. Unfortunately the SNP has turned it into the worst drug addicted country in Europe and people are struggling
@portman2396 The SNP? You're talking through your arse.
@allwrighty100 touched a nerve
@portman2396 sadly you speak the truth. The snp are both dividing and destroying the country and doing little else.
@Scotty good luck with that SNP fairytale. No evidence. No plan. No money. Can’t wait to see it. 🤣🤣🤣 🤡
I think $600 per stone is cheap for the quarrying, labor and machining involved to make a stone.
-Handmade curling stones made out of rare granite.
- The stones come from one island in the world.
-You have to ship to these stones to someone in the mainland by boat to make the curling stones.
-They only cost $600?!
That’s an insanely reasonable price.
Clearly its machine made with hand-assisted polishing and assembly.
My man, it's 600 dollars for a glossy rock.
That's what I was thinking...thats a steal of a price 🎉
meanwhile apple monitor stand cost 999$
@Davisrullzs And people pay Thousands to millions on smaller but shinier rocks that are surprisingly common as well aka Diamonds. Remember De Beers get Diamonds by truckload but only release a fraction of it to keep the "value" high.
Ngl, $600 sounds like an incredible deal for a big, heavy work of art painstakingly and precisely made by a skilled artisan out of rare stone harvested from a remote island…
1:07 It's fitting that from a distance the island with the granite used for curling stones looks like a giant curling stone.
Now I just watching Canadian players' fingers when releasing.
I mean I think 600 bucks is actually pretty cheap considering the logistics and skill needed to make the stone
It's also just stone so can't really be super expensive
@ramencakes5196 The diamond industry blacklisted you for that comment 😀
You can get exactly the same quality stones from other places. But the monopolists invented that whole bs story that you can get the stones only from that faraway island and bla bla bla
@MCXM111 Uh, no. Blue Hone is the superior granite for curling stones.
I had never heard of curling until sitting at my pub and the winter olympics were on the tele. The volume was turned down but I noticed many people focused on it. All the sudden they all erupted in cheering and it was a jump scare like no other. Then someone explained the game to me and by the fourth match I was hooked. Been following it every since and it's my number one sport at the winter olympics
People think it's a difficult sport to understand, when it's quite the opposite. I usually tell people, when getting into a new sport...just worry about how to score The rest you will pick up over time.
The only slightly more important sport at the olympics is hockey, also dominated by friendly Canada lol.
I grew up in the 60's and 70's in Northern Ohio. One of the broadcast TV stations we could get was CLKW from Detroit/Windsor. They had Curling on sometimes on the weekends, so I remember it from then. Always seemed fascinating to me. I'm glad it is going strong.
"Harvest" is a fun little rebranding of mining.
Quarrying*. Though you’re quite correct in your statement. They’re obviously trying to upsell themselves to appeal to the Brown Rice & Sandals Brigade, as my good aunt calls them. Rampant pssing vegans I calls ‘em 😀😀
Technically quarrying :)
I can honestly say that I have never in my life thought that the hand manufacturing of curling stones is even a thing or that one company taking granite from one island has lease over the Olympic Games! You know, every once in a while you come across a completely random nugget of information that just shocks you not only with how incredibly unique it is but with the notion of how unlikely it is that you would have ever pondered it yourself to the point where you might have looked it up online or something online. So, in other words, I probably would have gone my entire life completely oblivious to this process or this company or the history behind this unless I saw this video today. This is very cool and I am delighted to have come across this video!!!
These stones are work of art. I won't buy one, but sure respect the artisans who make these perfect stones
You don't buy one. You buy 16. You need a full set to play the game (8 red and 8 yellow). So that's about 10k.
@K1ddkanuck A quick search online confirms you can indeed buy a single stone. Imagine if one cracked, you'd have to buy 16 more to replace it?
@K1ddkanuck my man buys a whole library when a single book gets a scratch
@JayGatsby-1 I think his point is that if you're new to the hobby you wouldn't buy just one.
@18skeltor OP was talking about getting one for artistic value not starting the sport.
i have 0 idea what curling is but its satisfying hearing those rocks slide across the ice
Im watching this on my phone whilst also watching the game itself on the bike at the gym 😅😅
I love how the island in the first shot looks like a giant curling stone
I wonder how much of Canada's previous success was a result of cheating that was never discovered?
A few years back I remember I stumbled upon and enjoyed watching the Russian woman's curling team play. Then I figured out that the brooms and a players actually had an effect on the play and started to enjoy the game.
The Russian team came to live in Edmonton in western Canada to train and learn for a year. They were really great people and awesome athletes.
And easy on the eyes
Those masons, their hands must be rock hard.
please take a second and admire the amazing floor cleaning abilities of the guy who runs with the stone.
I have no idea why, but this sport caught me when I was a young child watching it at the Olympics and 30 years later, it's still the only sport I watch during the Olympics.
It caught me as well when I was 13. I had to give it up 53 years later.
No matter how pointless a profession ultimately is, seeing people in that profession care so deeply about their craft is always awe-inspiring
In what way is it pointless?
Most professions are pointless.
@randybobandy9828 Nah
@northpaul707 ya.
@randybobandy9828 I suspect you don't understand what the word "pointless" means.
Aliens millions of years from now will find these stones and insist we used them to grind corn. 😂
Wow, did not know any of this! Guess I was just taking it for granite
Boo
I can do one, that guys made of rocks!
Geology rocks!
Could you send some set of stones to US Congress? They've been found to be lacking...
Consuela killed it at the Olympics
I really wish he would use imperial units for weight.
He be like: yea so the stone is about 150 stones :D
I'm curious as to how the sport was invented in the first place and how these rocks were discovered and determined to be the best option to use considering their rarity in the world.
Because the sport was invented here in Scotland and they used the nearest source of top quality granite i.e Ailsa Craig
You are curious but cant look that up yourself? Doesnt seem like you are all that curious.
@Alexandros.Mograine. Same reason most people are on these platforms. To socially interact. tHat'S wHy It'S cAlLeD sOcIaL mEdIa....d*mb*ss.
Lies again? Contender Series Cold Storage
Because Scotland invented the game, and then Scots came to Canada and we perfected the play of the game.
When I saw the title I thought that the stones would cost like 15~20k each. $600 seems like a really reasonable price considering it's pure granite and it can last for decades
Yeah but the olympics last a few weeks and then move to another country. So they get to sell a new tournaments worth minimum every 4 years. Pretty sure they love making those stones because they bribed the olympics committee into having a monopoly. I don't believe for a second they are the only people capable of making them, or their super special granite is the only material that can be used. Its just corruption hiding behind a mask of snooty pretention.
Curling feels like an AI generated sport
I was thinking toddler generated, but that works too
To be fair if you told someone, who didn’t know of the sports, a vague description of any sports it would seem like an A.I made it.
Curling is literally the furthest you could get from AI in a sport...throw rocks across ice. Cave men would understand the concept.
That feels like an AI generated comment.
Curling was so fun back when I lived in Alaska.
But it was so hard and I was rather crap.
Can't believe how much goes into being a good curler, and I appreciate watching the games so much more now
The women's worlds are on now. If you watch closely there are now 2 sweepers but only one sweeps most of the time, one type of broom cuts the ice to add more curl for the rock to grip, and the other polishes the ice to let the rock slide and run straighter. The sweepers can carry a rock up to 12 feet and can swing it side to side as much as 6 feet. The throw, and spin added to the handle can also create many different swing paths. It takes enormous skill and strategy to be even a decent player, plus strength and endless cardio.
The Trefor quarry mentioned at 5.43 was founded by my family.
My grandfather Huw Darbishire was the General Manager for a time and the post was taken over by his brother Stephen Darbishire until the quarry was bought by Bath and Portland Stone.
I have a photograph of my mother drilling a boulder with an Holman Silver 3 drilling machine sometime in the early 50's so that it could be split into smaller pieces.
I spent many happy days there as a boy watching all the many facets of the production of granite for memorial stones, curling stones and road chippings.
Very cool. Thnx for that bit of history!
@chaplainmattsanders4884 you're very welcome
Very interesting addition. Sounds like fond memories.
Awesome!
What, what are the odds? Thanks for sharing that.
This video is 1000x more exciting than the sport itself.
because they banned fighting, smoking and drinking 60 years ago.
Canadian men and women’s team caught cheating 🤣2026
Yes.
I used to core concrete. I can't imagine how long it takes to run the bit through that granite!!
I bet it takes
Quite a bit
Even the island looks like a Curling Stone, then you know the rock has got to be good!
Who knew! I guess I won't be taking curling stones for granite anymore!
Boi what the hell boi 😂
Honestly I feel like $600 for one is actually a pretty good deal. That's what good manufacturing costs these days, if it were made by automated robot machines in China and not by hand then sure charge $150 for it, or cost plus 20% or so. Sure in that case cost is lower, but this is hand made by the exact same artisans every time - a monopoly, and I think given that, the price is fair.
Repent and believe in Jesus Christ go away, stop trying to spread religion to give attention to your youtube channel for personal gain. You're no different than crypto scammers.
reminder that machines are more precise AND faster than these same artisans in question, so, with the proper adjustments, settings, and materials, those "150$" "made by automated robot machines in China" curling stones would be MORE consistent than these ones, since they'd be made in indistinguishably identical movements
@a_lexine Did you even watch the video
@a_lexine measurement-wise they may be more consistent than those made by an artisan. However, as any mason would tell you, when cutting rock a machine can cause fractures for seemingly no reason. That's why it's better to leave it to people because they can prevent these from happening.
Seems like a scam. There should just be specific demensions and weight and bouncyness. İt shouldnt have to come from a specific quarry. Should be made like poolballs or bowling balls.
Curling is fun as heck and I encourage anyone who has a local club to give it a try.
$9,600 is the final price that the Olympic Games has to pay after ALL this work to make the stones? Seems cheap as heck lol
Per set. There are many sets
There is usually 4 sheets with two sets each, coming to 64 rocks (usually they have two sets of spares too, but I won’t count them) meaning the total cost is just under $40,000.
@joelm_42 But does the Olympic Committee only ordered 4 sheets for the _whole_ Winter Olympics?
@PanduPoluan The World Curling federation has a few sets of stones dedicated to international play. I’d be surprised if they’ve even ordered new ones in the past decade.
Curlings a fun sport. I did it growing up and have not played for a long time but I look back on it and enjoyed doing it a lot.
I'm surprised these guys have been producing stones for so long. like, it's amazing that there is still a demand for stones that are simply eternal after their manufacture. what athletes do with them, that they need new stones? it's a damn stone that slides on ice, its bottom can't wear out
They hit other curling stones too.
It feels like they eat them or something that they always need new ones
The stones wear out after a lot of play. The striking edge (the part that hits the other stones) gets thicker and thicker after lots of play and eventually the stones don't bounce off each other very well and can't be played with (on Olympic or championship level)
They are resurfaced/scuffed each day of play, and are replaced quite frequently in competition. Most sets of stones only are used competitively for a year, maybe 2.
I live in the village where its made
The making of the tools is more interesting than the sport
the times i have driven on that coast , and never knew Ailsa Craig' was used for this purpose .
For me this video takes the exclusive credit for the discovery of an interesting sport coming from a people as nice and culturally rooted as the Scottish. I'll definitely watch out for the upcoming world curling competition.
I don't know why I'm so captivated by this sport. I never seek it out. But when it's on... I'm hooked
Are these guys hiring? I'd move back to the country of my kinsmen and make these stones for the rest of my life.
Can we have a sport that throw socks ?
Cornhole?
sounds like something that Finland would do xP Wife Carrying and Phone Throwing and all kinds of weird 'national sports' - i wouldn't be surprised if there was asock throwing contest
Middle Easterns would win every year and it’d get boring fast. Like Tom Brady is in the super bowl again oh wow what a shockerrrrr
Shot putt. Tah dah
Just not a happy sock.
wtf I’ve literally never watched any curling before, i dont even know how it works or what the rules are, but i still watched the entire thing and found it pretty interesting
6:30 well I wonder why
Six hundred dollars? I was expecting somewhere between $1,000 and $2,000, considering the logistics, extraordinary quality, and craftsmanship involved in these beautiful works of art 🎨
If you were expecting between 1k and 2k, i wouldn't say 600 is too far off.
It says "so expensive" so i expected at least 50k per rock.
To be fair, you need 16 stones for a playable set, so the cost is more like 10 grand.
@mtark9988 600 is too expensive for basically "a rock". With nothing else than stonecutting. ;)
@badmaniak Can you cut stone like that?
You say that as if Stonecutting is an easy craft that doesn't involve hours of hard work and training to pull off.
What happens to all of the old stones? Do they go to some stone cemetary?
they go to stone heaven
They get sent to Ireland and put on the giants causeway.
Will be supplied to sports club newbies, for practice.
This business was for sale 2 years ago. Family run for 50 years, 4 employees. Turnover £180 a year. Purchase price was £160k. I looked at it, but then a friends brother in law bought it. Since then has grown the business. The Olympiad buys new sets for all teams every 4 years. The national teams also buys their own for training etc, as do aspiring individual players. The club scene is also growing since the last Olympics. It’s a healthy niche business based on artisan skills and local source on Ailsa Craig. There is a second site in Canada that can source the right quality granite. These are only two globally, so it is exclusive. There are considerable costs to mining and transportation from island and then machinery to make stones, with great skills needed.
It’s a good little business. They are branching out into hi fi stand and granite plant pot stands with the off cuts.
"Turnover £180 a year" what does this mean?
@kalocaK. 😮 180,000
Pretty competitive vs the price of an Olympic road bike, and looks a lot more durable.
You don’t like the idea of spending a small fortune on a bike? Lol
Nothing feels more Canadian to me than being in a small prairie town where they only have a few hundred people but they have a curling club and a hockey arena 🙂
Amazing how Canada is not winning every gold, Sweden with just a handful of curling teams is way more successful right now
@KickassTechnology Canada's women's team is 10-0 at the world championships today... so...
@vampfashions so what?
Bigger question is, why is curling a sport in the first place and who came up with it? Cold weather janitors I assume 😂
U r an idiot! American football is a stupid sport.
American football is literally just rugby with pads and a smaller ball sit down.@ownerlandlord4654
6:51 DONT YOU DARE TOUCH THAT STONE ! 😂😂
I dont know why i got this recommended but here i am now. A curling stone pro
I'd found out about these earlier thanks to an excellent article on BBC Travel! Glad to see it covered, although in an event as big as the Olympics, $600 feels "relatively" cheap (compared to the other stuff in the series)
$600 per stone and you need 16 for a set. So it's about $9600.
@hurricane9851 Plus 1 or 2 back up sets, and that covers 1 ice sheet, and most arenas have 4, with most curling clubs having 6-10 sheets.
They are expensive because finding stones shaped like that in nature is really rare.
I curled a few times before. I was naturally really and incredible amounts of force and nearly broke 3. They’re very nice to the touch and heavy.
Funny - I curled for 53 years and played a lot. In all those years, I never saw a stone break or even chip.
Wow I’ve seen that island before while I was on a ferry from Northern Ireland to Scotland to watch a football match when I was a kid and years later I’ve found out it has a interesting story😂 the island even looks kinda like a curly stone
I can see it from my front window :) Pretty stark island, great views of it from Troon etc
I wonder if aliens look at us like idiots
We look at aliens like idiots.
and then canada cheats with them
Here in Hawaii there is a game called "ulu maika" it's similar to this sport but with the ulumaika game you roll the stone on its edge like a tire.
sounds like lawn bowling. Are you aiming to be the closest to the marker in the middle?
@lukeboulter8735 yes! I like that term "lawn bowling" you put two wood stakes in the ground and roll the stone in-between
And I’ll just assume no ice is involved 😁
@rftulie no ice. The stone puck is similar though
Is balance of the stone an issue? If one edge of a stone weighs more, would that effect how it curls? I didn't see any mention of this.
It sure does
That's depending on the curl that the player uses when "throwing the stone". If the density of the rock is not even, or more dense to 1 side, the curl will veer off either right or left. Hard, into the side of the sheet, or off it's proposed path set by the player. In all probability, eliminating the stone from play before it reaches the destination down the ice.
The players are so well practiced that they can tell which stones will perform in which ways, and choose which to use to accentuate their ability. The worst is having to use 2 stones that are not evenly matched.
Who else is here after the cheating scandal?
When you consider the price of a graveyard granite headstone, $600 is peanuts.
There seems to be a lot of stones made.. how much of a demand is really there if they last for 20+ years?
At least in Canada most cities have at least 2 or 3 curling clubs, Toronto and Montreal have 10+. With something like 5+ sheets of ice per club. Each sheet needs 16 stones. Do the math and that's quite a lot of stones. The stones don't last forever, they need to be replaced when they get worn out. Then add the Olympics every 4 years and clubs in other counties and I think there's enough demand
It's so expensive that I can afford only one stone. And I can tell you it's quite difficult to compete with others when you have only one stone...
With one stone you can make a whole team, and then you can get more stones lol
I love Olympic Curling. The skill that players display is phenomenal.
It doesn’t belong in the Olympics. Many athletic sports belong there, not this.
Oh, you've seen Canada curling!
@luckyman11-11it’s really hard it deffo does belong.
When the island runs out of stones, the whole sport is doomed 😢
The process of making the curling stones is more interesting than the game itself.
So true.
It is more fun to watch than a damn superbowl
For those calling it lame, apply that same logic to EVERY other sport:
- Throwing a ball back and forth and some tackling...and call it American football
- Cars going in circles...racing
- Catching and batting a ball and throw in some adults scramming to snatch balls from children...baseball
- hitting a puck back and forth...ice hockey
The point is not all sports are for everyone. People can enjoy curling while others can enjoy ice hockey. What happened to COEXISTING?
My man just said ice hockey was just hitting a puck back and forth…
All those sports you mentioned involves a lot more physicality than curling which people tend to enjoy seeing in sports.
@chrisl9934 what about chess 5head?
@EliasClarkson And then 2 guys kicking the crap out of each other with knives strapped to their feet.