No elite athlete is ever going to say they’re over the moon to be left home when there’s a World Championship title at stake.
So I’m sure that when the women’s Worlds comes around in Canada later this month I’ll have a few ‘wish I was there’ thoughts.
Had we been selected it would have been an opportunity to complete a full set of European, Olympics and World golds in one year.
If you asked a top team in any sport if they wanted to go for it, you know they would say ‘bring it on’.
But I also know that there are a lot of other factors that come into selecting which team goes to the Worlds to represent Scotland in an Olympic year.
Congratulations to Team Morrison announced today as @scottishcurling representatives at @worldcurling champs later this month.
▶️https://t.co/Voa3Qrx3ay
📸Jayne Stirling & PPA Graeme Hart#curling #WWCC2022 pic.twitter.com/18l1wEaKhs— British Curling (@BritishCurling) March 8, 2022
I do understand why they’ve selected Team Morrison.
It becomes a massive talking point every four years.
After Vancouver we were back two days and went straight into the Scottish Championships, which we won and then got silver at the Worlds.
The Sochi one was tough.
We weren’t given the chance to retain our World title because the Olympic team wasn’t allowed to play.
Then after PyeongChang the Olympic team had a play-off against the Scottish champions.
Ourselves and Team Smith both lost that play-off after the Games, probably mainly because we were knackered.
I’m sure that has been factored into the selectors’ thinking this time around.
British Curling got the big decision right to go to a squad system and other girls who were on the programme will now get the chance to compete at a huge tournament.
And I’ll be cheering them on from back home to keep the curling feelgood factor going.
Fingers crossed myself and Bobby have done enough to earn selection for the World Mixed.
We won all our games at the Scottish Championships in Perth last week and beat our regular team-mates, Jen and Bruce, in a great final.
It’s a format of the sport I’m enjoying more and more and in my opinion Bobby is the best sweeper in the world.
Our games blend really well.
We caught up with Eve Muirhead and Bobby Lammie after winning the 2022 Scottish Curling Mixed Doubles Championship yesterday. 🤩🙌#TryCurling #LoveCurling #WinterSport pic.twitter.com/OBireq159F
— Scottish Curling (@scottishcurling) March 7, 2022
One thing I can say for certain is it’s a lot quicker!
In that final we were only on the ice for 55 minutes.
At a Worlds, Europeans or Olympics you can have 10 or 11-end games that last three to four hours.
Sometimes people are just going through the motions.
I’ve always been vocal about the need to drop it to eight ends.
So the contrast you get in mixed is really enjoyable.
It will be intriguing to see how the sport develops and whether the top of the game sees more teams doubling up as Britain did at the Olympics or if they become more diverse.
The Youth Winter Olympics is coming up in Finland soon and I’m an ambassador.
Unfortunately I can’t be at the Games because of Covid restrictions.
When I was down in London this week for my first BOA Athletes’ Commission meeting I did some videos to pass on advice.
Hopefully it will be useful.
Giving back to my own sport and others is something I love doing, that’s for sure.
