After a successful start to the season for the men with Team Mouat’s historic title win at the Baden Masters, British Curling’s women get their competitive season underway on home ice this week at the Euro Super Series event at Stirling’s National Curling Academy (August 21-25).
Early indications for the Olympic programme were hugely encouraging, with strong performances all round as world number five ranked Team Whyte reached the semi-final in Baden, losing narrowly to Mouat’s men, while Team Waddell, like fellow Scots Team Bryce only narrowly missed out on the play-offs and Team Craik finished with a win. 
Bruce Mouat, Grant Hardie, Bobby Lammie and Hammy McMillan meanwhile demonstrated battle hardness to defeat the host’s nation’s Team Schwaller at an extra end in the final and they defend their Euro Super Series title this week.
The five Scottish teams that went to Baden are joined by Orrin Carson’s national junior champions, while there is a strong international presence.
World number eight ranked Team McEwen are joined by fellow Canadians Team Chandler; Switzerland’s number 14 ranked Team Brunner by Swiss compatriots Team Stocker; world number 17 Team Ramsfjell by fellow Norwegians Team Haarstad and the USA’s world number 18 Team Dropkin by American compatriots Team Casper, while the Netherlands are represented by Team Gosgens.
Delaney Strouse’s meanwhile defend their title in the women’s event and are joined by fellow Americans Team Cousins, in a field which also includes world ranked number nine Italian line-up skipped by Olympic mixed doubles champion Stefania Constantini, Canada’s Team MacMIllan, Sweden’s Team Dryburgh and Switzerland’s Team Pfuegler.
In a 10-strong field, the four Scottish teams consequently know they face a testing start to the season as a crucial 2024/25 campaign gets underway, as Rebecca Morrison, who skipped the winning rink at the inaugural ESS event in 2021, acknowledged.
“It is nice to get these games in our home environment before we start our busy period going away to Canada and other countries this season, so we are really looking forward to it,” she said.
“We will be playing some really good teams and we have got teams from Sweden, the USA and Scotland in our group, so it is going to be a tough one but we are excited for the challenge.”
With Olympic champion Jen Dodds, Sophie Sinclair and Sophie Jackson, Team Morrison are, at world number 15, the highest ranked Scottish rink and are working to retain that position as the new season gets underway. 
“We have all been working very hard over the summer, especially in the gym getting our physical strength and fitness to a place where it wasn’t last season, so we are really excited to get back on the ice and put that into practice after six weeks of good training,” she said.
“It’s obviously a massive season ahead with Scotland looking to secure more qualifying points at major championships and getting GB a spot at the upcoming Olympic Games so it has been really inspiring watching the summer Olympics and we just want to be up there and performing well and beating amazing teams and would love to be representing Scotland at the Euros and Worlds this year to give ourselves a good chance for the Olympic Games.”
They know they face a strong domestic challenge after missing out at the Scottish Championships last season where Fay Henderson’s women claimed the title for the first time and, as she starts the season accompanied by another Olympic champion in Hailey Duff, as well as Robyn Munro, who was in Henderson’s team when she won the World Junior Championships last year, along with Katie McMillan and Lisa Davie.
“The summer has been good to get some rest and also to focus on some technical aspects of the game with different players, which has added different dynamics, so I think that is definitely a good start to the season learning what we need and how we can be the strongest player to get the best out of each other,” said Henderson. 
“It was nice to see the boys winning in Baden ahead of this event and we have been following the same kind of principles over the summer.
“Their training has obviously been put to good use with Team Mouat winning the title for the first time and a first for a Scottish team, but also Team Whyte having a really good weekend as well, so it was inspiring to see them off to such a strong start.”
The home contingent also sees Tia Laurie skip a line-up which includes this year’s fellow Youth Olympic gold medallist Holly Burke, as well as Cara Davidson and Kirsty Gallacher, while three more members of last year’s World Junior Championship winning team, skip Laura Watt, Holly Wilkie-Milne and Robyn Mitchell are joined by Mitchell’s sister Amy.
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Images: World Curling, Scottish Curling and Anil Mungal/GSOC
