What the Hell Are Curlers Always Yelling About?

If you're watching the Olympics and have a heart, you, like Mr. T, have probably fallen in love with curling. There are a lot of rules to figure out if you're new to the sport, but even after you've mastered the rules, the intense yelling might take you off guard. 

It's part of the sport's charm. You can hear competitors talk strategy. There's a transparency you don't often find in any sport. However, hearing the teams talk doesn't necessarily clear up what's going on with when curlers are yelling like Old Man Parker at the Bumpus hounds in A Christmas Story.

The yelling or line calling is mostly done by the skip, who is the team's captain. The skip gives the sweepers directions for what they need to do to make the shot the team is after. 

As you can see in these two videos, there are a lot of terms the skips are yelling out to the sweepers. To oversimplify it, they're telling the sweepers how hard or soft to sweep. 

Here are some of the terms you might hear, per the above videos from NBC and the Olympics Channel.

"Whoa" = stop sweeping (sometimes "up" or "off")
"Hard" = sweep intensely or fast (sometimes "hurry")
"Hurry hard" = sweep intensely with downward pressure
"Yup" = sweep it

Those are just a few highlighted above, but there are a ton of curling terms you need to know if you're going all-in on the game. It's basically its own language. 

Check back during the games for all of Thrillist’s continuing Olympics coverage. Think of us like an all-knowing friend watching along with you to answer all the important questions, like how heavy are Olympic medals. We'll explain everything from curling rules and figure skating scoring to what OAR means, why winning athletes are receiving stuffed animals and much, much more.

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Dustin Nelson is a News Writer with Thrillist. He holds a Guinness World Record but has never met the fingernail lady. Follow him @dlukenelson.