The Aussie Men had a successful week at the 2009 Karuizawa International Curling Championships and were rewarded with their solid play with the Bronze Medal.
This championship was established for commemoration of the Nagano Winter Olympics held in 1998 where curling was first offered as a full medal sport. Its main purpose is to disseminate curling throughout the country and to promote local people’s communication. This was the 4th trip to this tournament for Australia in the 11 years it has run. Top teams from the Pacific and World Championships are invited to attend the tournament.
The men finished the 8 team round robin alone in 3rd place with a 5 win and 2 loss record. The only losses came to the countries that finished 1st and 2nd in the Round Robin – Canada and China respectively.
This lined the Semi-Final matches of Canada versus Japan, and China versus Australia. After some exciting situations with 7 of the first 9 points of the game being stolen, Australia lost a very close semi-final 8-7 on the last rock of the game to the talented team from China who finished 4th in the World last year.
The Bronze medal game had Japan versus Australia looking for the last hardware. After being up 6-0 after 2 ends, Australia managed the lead well and finished the game with a 9-4 score line. (Good luck in Moncton at the World Championships Team Morozumi!)
Australian Skip Hugh Millikin says “it was a great week of curling for the team. After not playing since the Pacific Championships in November, we pulled together and played very well against Northern Hemisphere teams that are in mid-season form.”
The Bronze this year follows Silver from last year’s tournament. Millikin adds “it would have been nice to do one better and win the gold medal final, but the Bronze is nice result that we are still happy with in a tough field of teams.”
One thing that always amazes me is the amount of media coverage that curling receives in Japan. At this tournament there were approximately 10 camera crews filming each draw of the tournament (see below). Usually they are following Mari Motohashi quite closely – who is a bit of a cover girl in Japan. But with the Japanese, Chinese, Canadian, Norway men going to the World Championships this year there was additional material for them to focus on.
