What are they wearing now, we wondered?

So there we were, logging in to catch the end of the Thomas of Norway challenge match – Olympic silver medallist Thomas Ulsrud versus former teammate Thomas Due – as the Oslo Cup got underway. The media vehicle was trusty LAOLA1 TV, which is webstreaming curling matches all through this weekend’s event, but our first thought was: Geez, It’s Hard To See What Kind Of Pants The Ulsruds Are Wearing, With All That Advertising In The Background.

Then came a closeup… and we couldn’t believe our painful, bleeding eyes.

These pants are two shades of pink, with a touch of green.

How wonderfully, perfectly appalling. Feel free to click on the image (below left) and increase your own level of sweet, visual agony.

This event will also feature a few new team debuts, such as Canada’s Jennifer Jones (now with Kaitlyn Lawes, as first predicted by The Curling News) and Sweden’s new Team Anette Norberg. And the return of a curling titan… M-15, otherwise known as Finland’s 2006 Olympic hero Markku Uusipaavalniemi. Uusis – who is Still Quite Mighty – also appeared at the Baden Masters in Switzerland a couple of weeks ago, so he just might be back on the ice lanes for more than a brief vacation. Stay tuned.

Pain! Wonderful, appalling pain!

We’ve received some notes from fans who miss the more regular postings here at The Curling News Blog. To those who pine for the days of multiple daily postings and lengthy links provided, we share your wistfulness. On one hand, we are still providing a mammoth tonnage of curling links for your enjoyment – nearly 4,000 since last September, in fact – via our Twitter account, and if you aren’t following that vehicle, you are definitely missing out.

On the other hand, it has been quite frustrating to see subscription revenues for The Curling News, our core print product, actually stagnate during and after an otherwise successful Olympic curling season. Sure, of course, the print medium is in decline around the globe. But we are a specialty publisher, with 54 years of branded history behind us, and we feel that all curlers and curling fans should subscribe to the only hardcore, independent, Canadian curling publication that exists.

Call us crazy, call us obstinate… but this is what we believe.

And we would like to think that websurfers, aka rabid consumers of free content, would understand this frustration. If you do, dear reader, then please understand how we have stepped back from the TCN Blog, somewhat, to focus on our core product, which is due to relaunch for year number 55 next month.

If you happen to agree with us, and/or you don’t want to miss all this content we’re talking about, head to our online subscription page. And if you act quickly, you’ll dodge the price increase we are anticipating in the coming days.

Aaaaargh. Our eyes!

The 2011 curling season, if you haven’t noticed, is now underway.

In some ways, that glorious 2010 Olympic season never really ended. After the various world championships wrapped up in early May, the European summer spiels took place… followed by various World Curling Federation camps and clinics… then the regular winter season for Australia and New Zealand, as well as various U.S. summer recreation leagues.

Followed by Canadian summer camps, spiels and leagues… the Great Brazilian Curling Adventure™ right here on this blog (of course)… and now, the “official” fall season.

And there’s lots to watch, too. On Thursday night, CurlingZone launched online webstreamed coverage of the Ontario Curling Tour Championships in Oakville, Ontario utilizing the UStream platform. That first recorded game is archived here, and their live channel coverage (including a chat board) can be found here.

Just a few hours later, on Friday morning in Switzerland, the Baden Masters event kicked off Europe’s Curling Champions Tour. And by the time folks on Canada’s west coast had gone to bed, the new Brad Gushue/Randy Ferbey combination had won their first game of the season, 8-7 over Switzerland’s Dominik Maerki (the Swiss held leads of 3-0 and 5-2 early on).

The second round of play sees Norway’s Thomas Ulsrud taking on Russia’s Andrey Drozdov, with the Olympic silver medallists displaying new lime-green pants worthy of their Loudmouth Golf sponsorship (screen shot above). At this time of writing the match was being streamed live on LAOLA1.tv, with the Russians holding a 3-1 lead after five ends of play.

Some 10 matches will be streamed online during the tournament, including all pre-playoff games scheduled on sheet two. So there you go.

Want more curling, all the time? Make sure you follow The Curling News Twitter feed, with daily postings on The Roaring Game. There was no summer vacation there, trust us!

Very funny stuff coming out of Norway today, as it looks like the World Curling Federation won’t have to make a decision on Team Norway’s new “Shagadelic” flowered pants when the boys arrive later today or tomorrow in Cortina, Italy for the Capital One World Men’s Championship.

The outrageous pants (see yesterday’s blogpost) have already been banned by the Norwegian curling authorities, which includes national coach Ole Ingvaldsen and national team leader – and 2002 Olympic champion – Pål Trulsen (at left, beside team skip Thomas Ulsrud, in this TCN image from Anil Mungal).

Both Ingevaldson and Trulsen wore the original pants in Vancouver, but they clearly don’t want to wear these ones.

“They will not be used in the Worlds. These (colours) have very little to do with Norway. This is also not a fashion show,” Trulsen told VG Nett.

The same night of the team’s media conference on Tuesday, at which they displayed the new pant designs, the association and national team agreed that the psychedelic green pants could not be used. The manufacturer, Loudmouth Golf, has named the design “Shagadelic” which was a “vulgar” term used in the Austin Powers movies.

Click here for a VG Nett video story on the pants, which features interviews with pants supervisor Christoffer Svae and Ulsrud… and also includes Coach Ole on the telephone, giving his reasons for saying no to the pants. In describing the flowered pattern as “most suitable for curtains in an outhouse”, Coach Ole also added that “I think it’s okay to not play in all the world’s colors, but I think it is stupid when girls have just done it. Basically, I concentrate on the game.

“I think it’s a good decision,” said Ingvaldsen. “The point is that here is a team that travels, and those green pants are not Norwegian colours. As a team, I feel this is important. The clown pants in the Olympics were fine, because after all they were in Norwegian colors.”

“The news conference was a little Christoffer Svae stunt, I think,” said Trulsen. “I had not heard anything about this until the press called yesterday. Christoffer would probably like to use floral pants, but I think the NOK (association) isn’t ready for this yet.

“He is a bit impulsive, and that is no problem in principle, but we need to talk a little more together before this happens.”

What about these, Chris?

So, what else is really funny about this story? Two things.

First, the fact that the impossibly tiny curling fraternity in Norway is having this public, media-fuelled spat over the pants is truly hilarious.

“I’m writing an email to the board (of the NOK) right now to ask why the girls could use the disco pants when we cannot use the new pants,” Svae told VG Nett. “I personally think the green pants are fine. I think it’s a bit stupid.

“I’d like signals from the NOK in advance because it was all right with the (Olympic) clown pants. Basically, it is a good idea to get publicity, but they never do that, so we went there.”

The second hilarious item is that the first Olympic pants, the red, white and blue argyle pattern, were ruined in an unfortunate laundry incident. And Loudmouth Golf sold out of the original clown pants design within days of the start of the Olympic curling competition and is only now shipping new product around the world.

“We would like to use the clown pants from the Olympics, but some guys with bad laundry experience washed them, and they turned pink,” explained Trulsen.

“Torger (Nergard) and I made  fools out of ourselves,” admitted Ingvaldsen. “They must be washed at room temperature, but we washed them at 40-45 degrees, and the colours changed. So we needed new pants.”

Of the two new designs, only the blue and white checkered pants will be won in Cortina, while the other pair of Olympic argyle pants – which are in red, white and gray – will replace the Shagadelics.

Finally, why not vote YEA or NAY for the pants? Head back to the VG Nett story and look at one of the little boxes under the video player, which is a poll asking “How do you like the new clown pants?” (Hvordan liker du curlingguttas nye klovnebukser?)

Here, we’ll help you vote… in Norwegian!

Huff, de ser ikke bra ut (Ugh, they do not look good)
De er kjempefine (They are super fine)

Then click STEM (VOTE) in the little grey box, and watch the results pop up!

Yes, the secret is out. And our eyeballs hurt.

The secret is out!

The latest version of the Norwegian Curling Team Pants is set to hit the ice in gorgeous Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy this Saturday.

The event, of course, is the 2010 Capital One World Men’s Curling Championship. And the originators of the Pants Craze, Thomas Ulsrud‘s Olympic silver medallists from Norway, open their campaign at 14:00 CET against Scotland’s Warwick Smith.

The only question is: will it be the blue and white checkered pattern for Game 1, or the swirling multicoloured… flowers?

“I just follow the fashion police,” is all that skip Ulsrud has to say, nodding to teammate Christoffer Svae. The burly second thrower (second from right in the John Hauge photo at left) is the one who found the pants, made his teammates wear them during the first Olympic practice in Vancouver… and the rest is history.

“I must admit that when I saw 10 cameras following us in that first practice, I thought: ‘This was a good idea then, Christoffer,’ ” Svae told Norway’s Aftenposten.

The blue and white pants were worn by Norway’s junior men’s team at the World Juniors in Champery, Switzerland earlier in March. Norway’s Paralympic wheelchair curlers then followed up with a tealish-blue and white pattern in Vancouver, plus Ulsrud’s original Olympic design, and of course the Norwegian women’s team went full-on bonkers with a wild, spotty “disco” pattern last week in Saskatchewan (photo can be seen here).

As reported a few weeks ago on The Curling News Twitter feed, Team Norway has since inked a sponsorship deal with Loudmouth Golf, the U.S. manufacturers of the pants.

Stay tuned to The Curling News for more info on Team Ulsrud, the Cortina Worlds and so much more in this fantastic 2010 curling season.

It ain’t over yet, folks!

[Aftenposten photo by John Hauge. Click to increase size]