 Opening day action from Cortina d'Ampezzo saw the German, Norwegian and Swiss rinks jump ahead of the pact as round robin play wraps up Friday (Photo: Celine Stucki/WCF). By: Cameron Sallaj Heading into the inaugural Cortina Curling Cup at the Olympic Ice Stadium, South Korea's Gim Eun-ji and Italy's Stefania Constantini were the top two ranked teams after a stellar 2023-24 season to date. Despite this, both teams suffered losses on the opening day, being passed up by other strong European teams from Germany, Norway and Switzerland. The German team, headed by skip Mia Hohne with fourth Emira Abbes, second Pia-Lisa Scholl and lead Maike Beer scored two upset victories to begin their campaign. Coming in as the ninth ranked team of ten with a 14-22 win/loss record on the season, the team won 7-3 against Corrie Hurlimann (Zug, SUI) in their opening game before escaping Marie Kaldvee (Tallinn, EST) 7-6 in an extra end game Friday night. After failing to qualify Germany for the World Championship for the first time since 2005, Team Abbes are looking to close out the 2024 portion of the season with more successful results. On day 2, the team will meet another undefeated team in Norway's Marianne Rorvik before closing out their round robin against the top ranked Gim team of Korea. Speaking of Rorvik, with fourth Kristin Skaslien, second Mille Haslev Nordbye and lead Martine Ronning, their team is rolling right along, continuing their bronze medal momentum from the European Championships in November. The team began the Cortina Cup with a 5-4 upset win over Korea's Gim in an extra end before downing Team Hurlimann 7-1 in Draw 3. The reigning world silver and euro bronze medalists, currently holding a 24-15 record on the season will meet Abbes and Kaldvee on the second day of competition with a win securing their spot in the playoff round. In Pool B, one team sits alone at the top of the standings. The Zurich foursome of Xenia Schwaller, Selina Gafner, Fabienne Rieder and Selina Rychiger stole three against the hometown favorites Constantini to win their opening match 7-5 before going on to beat Robyn Munro (Stirling, SCO) 7-4 in Friday night action. With a 32-13 record so far this year, the Schwaller foursome has been dominant on tour, securing four consecutive event titles between October and December. The team will close out their round robin against Dilsat Yildiz (Erzurum, TUR) and Rebecca Mariani (Trentino, ITA). The only other undefeated team after day 1 of competition is the Yildiz rink of Turkiye, winning 9-3 in their sole match against Team Munro. Action from the Cortina Curling Cup runs January 11 to 13 at the Olympic Ice Stadium in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy, the curling venue for the upcoming 2026 Olympic Games. Watch the replay from the opening round of games from Cortina (Gim vs. Rorvik; Constantini vs. Schwaller; Hurlimann vs. Abbes): |
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Calgary's Brad Jacobs (Photo: Curling Canada/Andrew Klaver) defeats Winnipeg's Matt Dunstone 6-5, winning 2 games to 0 in a best-of-three final at the Montana's Canadian Olympic Curling Trials in Halifax, N.
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