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Despite the shattered medal dreams in Beijing, the Swiss curlers were able to play freely at the World Cup tournament. They revealed that – with gold in their luggage – when they returned from Canada.
At the Winter Games in Beijing in February, the female Swiss curling team did an excellent job – and walked through the Round Robin with 8 wins from 9 games. 2 defeats in the decisive phase of the tournament cost a medal.
Just 4 weeks after the disappointing 4th place at the Olympics, the World Championships started in equally distant Prince George, a city in the center of the Canadian province of British Columbia. With World Cup gold number 3 in a row, the CC Aarau team has impressively succeeded in rehabilitation.
Same template – completely different ending
After the identical starting position as at the Olympics in the two medal games, nerves could have fluttered. But this time the Swiss women wrote their fairy tale undeterred and kept up their winning streak – in addition to the world title, they can boast a record balance of 14 successes from 14 matches.
“None of us had Beijing in mind. Only the moment counted,” said team number 2 Esther Neuenschwander after returning to Zurich on Wednesday morning. Skip Silvana Tirinzoni added: “We found the World Cup to be a completely different team. And negative thoughts from the past have no place on the ice anyway.”
The goals don’t run out: privately and on the ice
The 3 other members of CC Aarau also looked back on the challenging World Cup tournament and the importance of success when they were received in their home country. This is how Neuenschwander classifies the three titles: The premiere in 2019 was a single fight, followed by the Corona edition in a “bubble”, and “now a cool World Cup tournament in Canada, where we could just go all out”.
The athletes also revealed how things are going for them after the World Cup triumph and how their energy balance is. As a team, they leave for Canada again in 10 days. “This period of time is just enough to regain full possession of your strength. Then there are two Grand Slam tournaments. It would be our dream to succeed at this level one day,” says Tirinzoni, setting the course.
And individually, the players are now busy with very different plans: they have to fill the rein boxes or get back to work in the office – and in the case of Alina Pätz, throw a birthday party for her boyfriend.