Wheelchair curling rocks venue and breaks records at Sochi 2014 Saturday, 15 March 2014 - 18:51 SOCHI - Records were set, the stands were packed and the home country almost delivered a dream finish at the wheelchair curling competition at the Sochi 2014 Paralympic Winter Games. Russia may have been comprehensively beaten 8-3 by Canada in the final on Saturday but it defied its status as a Paralympic Winter Games debutant in the sport and posted the best record from the round-robin stage, before the big-game experience of a decorated Canadian side shone through. Canada maintained its perfect record at this level and is still the only team to have won gold in Paralympic wheelchair curling history. Great Britain rotated its squad and throwing order throughout the competition and squeezed into the medal round as the No 4 seed. Britain had been beaten 6-3 by China in the round-robin only two days before it exacted revenge in the bronze-medal game with a 7-3 triumph. China brought by far the youngest squad to Sochi 2014, and the young guns, with an average age of just 28, initially appeared overawed, losing two of its first three games. They bounced back to win four from the next six, but came unstuck against more experienced opponents in the medal round. At the start of the competition, newcomer Slovakia set the early pace with three wins from its first three games, but its run towards the semifinals was stalled by Great Britain and then derailed in a record Paralympic Winter Games 16-0 blanking by Canada, which set Paralympic Winter Games records for points scored and margin of victory. Finland was on the wrong end of some close games before registering its first win of Sochi 2014 with a demolition of Great Britain, then concluded round-robin play with a 12-1 dispatch of Canada. The frustrations were clear to see for the Finns, who ended up beating two of the three medallists, only to lose to everyone else. USA almost completed a remarkable turnaround by winning three games on the bounce after losing four of its first five. Norway inflicted a 10-0 shutout win on Korea in their first game but the teams ended up tied together above Finland at the bottom of the standings, with three wins and six defeats apiece. There was controversy over the playing conditions at the Ice Cube Curling Centre. Sweden, in particular, struggled early on and its skip, Jalle JUNGNELL (SWE), was the most vocal critic of the ice, calling it terrible. When conditions improved towards the end of the competition, the Swedes found their groove with huge wins over Korea and Norway, but it was too little, too late, and they ended the round-robin tied with USA and Slovakia at 4-5. Despite a string of stellar performances, Canadian skip Jim ARMSTRONG (CAN) also admitted to struggling with the conditions and called the stones aggressive, before realising that they were not the same as the rocks used for the 2013 world championship, which was held as a test event in Sochi. It did not prove decisive and ARMSTRONG has now won gold in every world championship or Paralympic Winter Games that he has competed in, five in total. PNS ph/nr/mr
Posted on: Sun, 16 Mar 2014 12:21:40 +0000
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