With the 2017 Women's Curling World Championship currently taking place in Beijing, CGTN brings you a guide to a sport that many casual observers may not be familiar with.  

Curling is a sport mainly played in cold weather countries and regions in which teams slide cylindrical stones, also known as rocks, down a long sheet of ice with the aim of guiding them into a circular bulls eye known as the house, while also blocking the other side from doing the same, or even better, knocking their stones aside and replacing them with your own. 

In order to make this process easier, several team members sweep the ice to help guide each rock along. 

The length of the ice sheet from the inside edges of the back boards is 45.720 meters (150 feet).

The width of the sheet from the inside edges of the side lines is a maximum of 5.000 m. (16 ft. 5 inches).

This area is delineated by lines drawn, or by dividers placed on the perimeter.

A center hole (tee) is placed at the intersection of each tee line and center line.

With the tee as center, there are four concentric circles placed at each end of the sheet, with the outer edge of the outer circle having a radius of 1.829 m. (6 ft.), the next circle a radius of 1.219 m. (4 ft.), the next circle a radius of 0.610 m. (2 ft.), and the innermost circle having a minimum radius of 15.24 cm. (6 in.).