Where to Curl in New York, New York

NEW YORK CITY – There is plenty for a sports enthusiast to do in this town. As they say, my city is so nice, they named it twice. 

(For all those tempted to hate mail, I’m from Brooklyn, they’ll just read like love letters.) 

New York sports fans have four hockey teams, two baseball teams, three basketball teams and five football teams. The Belmont Stakes and the US Open are right around the corner. If you want some of it in my town, you can find it. 

If one is more of a winter sports fan or a doer, there are iconic skating rinks at Central Park, Rockefeller Center, and Prospect Park, where one can find a group of intrepid curlers. 

 Than Tibbetts was concerned with the travails of finding a decent apartment in the city of New York when the Minnesota native spotted a bit of home while walking through Prospect Park. 

Tibbetts is a prototypical curler, if such a thing exists, right out of central casting. His broad build speaks to his ability to throw 40-pound stones; his blonde locks and sincere visage suggest his Minnesota Viking roots. 

Tibbetts’ first lesson at the St. Paul Curling Club was with 2006 United States Olympian Cassie Johnson (now Potter), while filling in for her husband, a high school friend, in a husband-and-wife league. 

“When I moved to New York and stumbled on the pile of curling stones in the park, my first thought was, here’s a great place to land and meet a bunch of people. I was house hunting and took a walk through the park on a nice sunny day in mid-February or something. Stones were sitting there next to the ice rink where they live in winter,” remembered Tibbetts, who moved to New York in 2019. 

“I’ve heard enough horror stories about finding an apartment in New York City. I was just sort of focused on the mission. I saw the curling stones and was like… this is the area I want to be in. I need to move within a quick walk or ride of this place. I know going to find a soft landing in New York.” 

Tibbetts had stumbled upon the Brooklyn Lakeside Curling Club. Started by a few dauntless curlers in 2014, the club has grown to 120 members. The fervent demand was such that Tibbets, now the club’s vice president, established Broomfitters in 2020 to address the local need for curling equipment. 

Currently, membership is limited by the availability of good ice, a premium resource when curling on a hockey rink. He and club president Erike Omundson are skipping the club's effort to find a dedicated curling space. The club, which operates as a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit, helps meet its operating expenses through membership dues and lessons, supplemented by occasional corporate team-building curling events. 

“It’s a fun time, it’s very social, and it’s stress-free work,” explained Omundson, while sipping an adult beverage after the club’s Wednesday night league. They also have a league on Sunday.

“This is very much part of it, broomstacking. In Brooklyn, you’ve got a very broad cross-section of people. We have good people, consistently.” 

“I enjoy the sport, I wouldn't call myself an amazing curler or anything,” added Miska Drascoszy. “For me and other people, it's just an awesome social thing. People are super chill. Everyone is super friendly.”

The club’s resolute curlers reflect Brooklyn’s diverse makeup. One member serves as a coach for the Filipino curling team; his fiancée works with the Puerto Rican curling team. There is a family, comprising a mother, a father, and their 13-year-old son, as well as the curler who boasted of their initiation through a queer romance novel. They gave the real thing a whirl and found welcoming enthusiasts. 

“New Yorkers have such a striving attitude. Everything is like a networking event,” added Tibbetts, who helped bring street curling to city-sponsored block parties in the summer of 2024. “I’ve gone years without knowing what some of these folks do for work. We come, and curl and talk about our shot, the ice conditions, or strategy for the rest of the night; it’s truly this little space for us to enjoy the game and kind of turn off everything else.” 

“I love it here. What we lack in consistent ice, we make up for with camaraderie,” added Husani Blaze, a director of Curling Jamaica. “We are in Brooklyn, which is a diverse place. New York has so many people, so many transplants. Having programs like ours aimed at more diverse populations – those people can then go back to where they’re from and talk about (curling).”

One of the Brooklyn Curling Club's primary missions is to attract newbies to the ice. The club’s Try Curling program is similar to Scotland's national Try Curling initiative. The core tenet is to get people out on ice, show them the basics, and let them fall in love with curling. 

The Brooklyn Curling Club also has a rookie league for those inclined to gain more experience without the pressure of performing alongside advanced curlers. I was there for the last week of the previous 2024-2025 season, and the rookies were performing like seasoned veterans. 

Try Curling instructor Asher Dratel was born right across the Brooklyn Bridge in Battery Park City. He caught the curling bug while watching the Olympics with his folks. Aided by a healthy dose of armchair broomstacking, curling often becomes a cyclical phenomenon every four years, after which, outside winter sporting hubs, it fades into the background.

Dretel joined the Brooklyn Lakeside rookie league after a lesson and now takes new curlers through their first paces on the sheet. 

Asher had the onerous task of guiding this writer through his first strides on the sheet; he articulated the nuances of throwing with aplomb, but to little avail. Sweeping was simple enough if you understood the game. Listen to your skip, move your feet, drive, and create friction until you’re told to stop. 

Throwing is another story. I’d have had an easier time doing a bicep curl with 40 lbs., even after 40. Despite my alarming lack of skill, while unable to execute, I knew the fundamentals and had an enjoyable experience. 

“We’re on outdoor shared ice,” said Dratel. “You can’t take it too seriously. Everyone has a lot of fun. 

“I think we’re like the toughest curlers in the country, Brooklyn. We go up to Ardsley and look like oafs, but those guys wouldn’t last five minutes out here…” 

One thing is certain: I am not Asher’s favorite student. 

“I actually met my fiancée in the rookie league; she was one of my students,” said Dratel. “It’s funny, we worked in the same building and didn’t know it. We like telling the story. People assume we met in the elevator. We’re like, ‘no, we met curling at Prospect Park.’” 

As for a scouting report on this writer’s play, Asher said he’d seen worse. One cannot be sure if this was a direct comparison, but Dretel remembered the suit who showed up to a corporate curling event in high heels. 

Solace is solace.