Absolutely in agreement with Snella,
We were way closer to reality with the control the brush was offering with your recent improvement. We were not at the mercy of such fine tuning of the mouse click. But the main concern is realism and you had it. A big dimension of the game is lost with the original set-up, please go back to what you let us taste. If necessary, cut a little bit in the brushing effect but keep a good 2.5 m (more like non-professional sweepers effect).
Those who are more "video game" players than ice curlers and might have complained with the change will get used to it with time and will understand better the game when they watch it on tv.
All the best,
Boomurl