Frozen out

The Grand Match Committee must be the laughingstock of Scotland following its decision to cancel the outdoor curling tournament on the Lake of Menteith (your report, 9 January).

It seems the emergency services "could not guarantee players' safety". Presumably, they would have been unable to do so when the Grand Match was last held, in 1979 and 1963, but were thankfully not asked because the nanny health and safety culture had yet to be invented.

Many sports involve danger of one sort or another and it is surely up to participants to make their own risk-assessment rather than have the conservative assessments of others thrust upon them.

That said, I would hope nobody would go as far as the person whose car went through the ice on the lake in 1963 – I recall hearing of this as a child the day after I had walked over the frozen expanse to Inchmahome Priory.

I've often wondered what model it was and if it is still there.

JOHN HEIN

Montgomery Street

Edinburgh