Drift

A drift when throwing is a deviation of the slide delivery to the right of the line of throw for a right hander or to the left for a left hander. The drift is a major fault and must as soon as possible be corrected to maintain a regular level of performance.

While using the traditionnal technique which is the lift of the rock on the backswing, the drift is often found on beginners, but almost unexistant for the competitors. With the advent of the No Lift Delivery technique, this drift fault is more and more frequently found even at competitive level.

What causes the drift? During the forward swing, the stone is pushed toward the target (skip brush) and the sliding foot, for a right hander, is moved forward from left toward the center of the body consequently to the right. If this left to right forward movement (always for a right hander) is not contor balanced during the forward swing, we will find a drift of the slide delivery toward the right side of the target. Generaly, this drift is more palpable on big weights since the forward movement is done faster.

Correcting the drift, one can not eliminate the the left to right movement of the sliding foot; at the most one may reduce the sideward movement by placing the sliding foot closer to the line of throw during the backsing. In spite of that, the correction of the drift is very easy : one must correct the TIMING of the forward swing which is :the forward movement of the stone must come before the forward movement of the sliding foot. When the stone is pushed toward the target and the sliding foot comes afterward in the sliding position during the trust of the hack leg, the slide delivery is straight and there is no drift.

On the other hand, there is a drift when the forward movement is simultaniously done by the stone and the sliding foot. If you know someone who drift durlig his/her slide delivery, check his/her forward swing and you will find that the stone and the sliding foot simultaniously come forward. Ask him/her to first put forward the stone and secondly the sliding foot ; the drift will disappear. In order to control the timing of the forward swing, I strongly recommend to start with the same timing on the pullback swing whish is : first, pull back the stone and than the sliding foot.

A better timing of the pull back favors the correct timing of the forward swing.

One question comes : Why don't we find drift on competitors using the traditionnal backswing? When lifting the stone during the backswing, the stone automatically comes back forward first and the proper timing is respected.

With the No Lift Delivery, the stone being always in front of the curler, it is easy to forget the correct timing and to simultaniously move forward the stone and the sliding foot. Using the No Lift, one has simply to think of TIMING. André Ferland