EVE MUIRHEAD: Team Mouat show us the way and family name was never a curling burden for me

We really couldn’t have asked for a better start to competitive curling than we got last week.

First game back here in Calgary we beat the current Olympic champions and second game it was a win against the reigning world champions.

RECAP: It's been a good start for 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 in the Humpty's Champions Cup with @Team_Muirhead and @TeamMouat both moving up to 2-0 records Friday morning.

✍️ @JonathanBrazeau | #curling #GSOC 🥌 https://t.co/R8lmUo6KRj

— Pinty's Grand Slam of Curling (@grandslamcurl) April 16, 2021

Losing in the play-offs of the first Grand Slam event was a shame but it wasn’t anything to beat ourselves up about.

Every match we lost was a tight one – last end, last stone.

It’s been a similar story at the start of this week’s Grand Slam but it’s been the same for most of the teams, as you would expect.

Lack of competitive ice-time has affected us all.

It probably won’t be until the Worlds that we can truly get a handle on who is in form and where we are in the pecking order.

That’s the one we all want to produce our best curling at.

What gives us real encouragement is the progression the Scottish men’s team have made.

Team Mouat had more tournaments than us and have steadily got better and better.

We’ve definitely matched them for that commitment.

That culminated in them winning their second Slam last weekend.

When you get a silver at the Worlds it’s important to take all the positives rather than let disappointment at missing out on gold fester.

They’ve always been a really talented team and they put in a lot of hard work during the curling shutdown.

We’ve definitely matched them for that commitment.

So it gives us real encouragement that all the work we’ve put in at Stirling will pay off in the next few weeks and months as well.

There will be some few ‘bubble’ changes over the next few days.

The likes of Sophie Sinclair, our fifth for the Worlds, will join us after her hotel quarantine period, at which point some of the Slam teams will leave and other World teams come into it.

Sounds confusing but everything has been running like clockwork, touch wood!

Whenever there’s a son or daughter of a famous mum or dad who follows their parent into sport, it gets more headlines than if that athlete was an ‘unknown’.

It’s not right or wrong, it’s just a fact.

Mike Atherton’s boy, Josh, is following in the former England cricket captain’s footsteps and from what I read, he’s in with a good chance of having a successful career.

It’s interesting to see that he’s taken his mum’s name (de Caires) but that’s obviously a personal decision made long before he knew he’d end up in professional sport.

Josh de Caires, son of former England captain Mike Atherton and great-grandson of former West Indies batsman Frank de Caires, has signed for Middlesex on a three-year deal.

— ESPNcricinfo (@ESPNcricinfo) August 25, 2020

From my own personal experience there was no downside to having a dad who had been to the top in my sport.

He has been the biggest influence on my career as far as things like dedication and the way I conduct myself on the ice are concerned and it was following him around that helped me fall in love with curling in the first place.

I can’t say that I’ve ever felt it a burden when somebody has said: ‘That’s Gordon’s daughter’.

And, apart from anything else, there are loads of other family names in curling who go from generation to generation.

It’s so common that everybody just takes it for granted!

THE BREAKDOWN, STEVE SCOTT: Scotland’s players need and deserve a break instead of another meaningless competition