Ireland has a couple of sports that are unique to their country. One is hurling, a sport that is considered the fastest game on turf. For Americans we believe lacrosse to be the fastest sport, but when you see a game of hurling you can see that it is much faster. After watching my first hurling match yesterday between Kilkenny and Offaly, the first match broadcast on sky sports, I am hooked on the hurling.

Kilkenny vs Offaly at Nowlan Park

The game of hurling is played with 15 players. The player wears a helmet and holds a hurly (a curved stick) which he hits the ball or "sliotar" down the pitch and tries to get the ball through goal posts either above or below the cross bar. Like soccer there is a goalkeeper equipped with only the hurly to protect the goal. According to the GAA, Gaelic Athletic Association, "You may strike the ball on the ground, or in the air. Unlike hockey, you may pick up the ball with your hurley and carry it for not more than four steps in the hand. After those steps you may bounce the ball on the hurley and back to the hand, but you are forbidden to catch the ball more than twice. To get around this, one of the skills is running with the ball balanced on the hurley To score, you put the ball over the crossbar with the hurley or under the crossbar and into the net by the hurley for a goal, the latter being the equivalent of three points." From that you can see that the game has to move fast. Players will hit the ball down the field to teammates who will try to get the ball through the posts. It is easier to get the ball through the uprights above the crossbar, but you only get 1 point. A goal though much harder gets 3 points. The scoring of a match such at the Kilkenny match yesterday was scored 5-32 to 1-18 or 5 goals and 32 single points for a total of 47 points to Offaly's 21 points.

A match consists of two 35 minute halves running time. There are no timeouts, no injury timeouts and play is constant for 70 minutes with a short half time. Players are given water when there is a penalty shot or they are near the sidelines and if a player gets hurt then trainers run onto the pitch taking care of the player, all with play still going on. The reason I say that hurling is faster than lacrosse is that once a goal or point has been scored the goalkeeper takes a new ball and immediately sends it down the field, unlike lacrosse where they will bring it back to midfield and have another face off.  

During my first week in Ireland I visited with Trevor Dargan at Woodenbridge Golf Club and he showed me some of the basics of hurling. He is an avid fan and supported of the sport and his children all play the game. It was different to play the new sport, but at the same time it was fun and I could see that hurling can be  a fun game. Much of the principles of hurling at similar to baseball. Hand and eye coordination is key and takes skill to hit the ball on the run. However, the grip for holding the hurley is opposite to baseball with the back hand on top of the front arm. It is like having a righty bat left with the same grip. Here is a short video of my first hurling lesson. 

In addition to the hurling lesson, Jon and I visited Eric Roche in Kilkenny for a look in at the making of a hurley. Eric is one of the best in the business. Much like wood baseball bat making, hurley making transforms a piece of wood into a usable piece of equipment through cutting and sanding. 

Tracing the Hurley

Sanding

Finished Products

Eric Roche and I

Here is a video that TurfNet made two years ago when Cam Cooper, the first intern, came over.