17-04-2015, 23:10
To continue our discussion, the old style of play in many games was for the team in the lead to take out any opposition stones that were in play, sometimes even their own ones, to stop the opposition trying to get in behind them to score shots. A skill in itself, but totally boring to watch, as well as play against. To combat this, the Free Guard Zone was first introduced about 25 years ago where the first four stones could not be used to take any stone not in the rings out of play. This rule was gradually accepted to be in the best interests of the game and is still in operation today.
Mixed Doubles is a relatively new style of competition, but the aim was the same - to make the actual playing of shots and the tactics much more important than the sweeping. I've played Mixed Doubles a few times and it's very challenging as you need to be much more precise in playing the stone. There's less sweeping in that the player has to catch his/her own stone to sweep it or the player at the far end has to come to meet it. As you'll have seen, in the normal rinks game, two sweepers can sweep it all the way.
Mixed Doubles is a relatively new style of competition, but the aim was the same - to make the actual playing of shots and the tactics much more important than the sweeping. I've played Mixed Doubles a few times and it's very challenging as you need to be much more precise in playing the stone. There's less sweeping in that the player has to catch his/her own stone to sweep it or the player at the far end has to come to meet it. As you'll have seen, in the normal rinks game, two sweepers can sweep it all the way.
Cabbage is still good for you