![]() Switzerland's Briar Schwaller-Hurlimann and Yannick Schwaller (Photo: World Curling) are on the outside looking in as the race to qualify heats up in Cortina. By Cameron Sallaj It's been an up and down week for Swiss married couple Briar Schwaller-Hurlimann and Yannick Schwaller as they currently sit right in the middle of the mixed doubles standings with three games left to play. The pair, who finished fourth at the 2024 World Mixed Doubles Championship to secure Olympic qualification, started off the Games with a big 9-7 extra end win over Estonia's Marie Kaldvee and Harri Lill. They then lost to the United States' Cory Thiesse and Korey Dropkin 7-4 but bounced back to beat South Korea's Kim Seon-yeong and Jeong Yeong-seok 8-5. In their next two games, the Swiss pair struggled, resulting in consecutive losses to Italy and Sweden by significant margins of 12-4 and 13-7 respectively. Looking to get back into the win column, the duo went up against Czechia's Julie Zelingrova and Vit Chabicovsky in Saturday night's Draw 9. Starting without the hammer, the Swiss side came out firing, taking a steal of two to open the game. They then traded singles with the Czechs through the next three ends, continuing to hold a one-point lead into five. Coming back in the second half, the Schwaller's continued to apply pressure to Czechia, resulting in a score of four to give them a massive five-point lead. After forcing their opponents to one on the power play, the Swiss added three more to their total to close out the game in dominant fashion, 10-3 the final score. With four draws left in the mixed doubles round robin, Schwaller-Hurlimann and Schwaller currently sit just outside the playoff picture, tied for fifth with Canada at 3-3. The pair will next face so far undefeated Great Britain (7-0) before closing out the round robin against Norway and Canada. To secure qualification, the pair will need to win all three of these games while even a single loss could eliminate them from competition. While Briar and Yannick have been busy on the ice, their son River has made quite the impression on social media. The one-and-a-half year old, dubbed "The Curling Baby" has gone viral for a cute moment playing with Briar's broom following the pairs opening draw win.
Olympic Mixed Doubles Standings - Draw 9 Great Britain (Dodds/Mouat): 7-0 The United States (Thiesse/Dropkin): 4-2 Italy (Constantini/Mosaner): 4-2 Sweden (Wrana/Wrana): 4-3 Switzerland (Schwaller-Hurlimann/Schwaller): 3-3 Canada (Peterman/Gallant): 3-3 Norway (Skaslien/Nedregotten): 2-4 Estonia (Kaldvee/Lill): 2-4 Czechia (Zelingrova/Chabicovsky): 1-5 South Korea (Kim/Jeong): 1-5 |

















