Well...

I don't have curly hair, but my sister's is really tight ringlets, waist length when curly, and she does some neat stuf with it, I'll try to describe. She plays a lot of sports and wants it out of the way without having to take time on it.
Okay, so one she does a lot is this one, which makes it look like a really short ponytail. She pulls her hair back into a ponytail, then twists it into a small loop, securing it with a hairtie. The curly ends waterfall over the loop and it looks like a short ponytail. It doesn't work with straight hair because only curls will cover the loop properly.
Hope that made sense haha